Going Green!

A statewide partnership involving the City of Dover, Delmarva Power, Delaware Municipal Electric Corporation (DEMEC), Delaware Sustainable Energy Utility (SEU) and LS Power will lead to the construction of one of the Mid-Atlantic region’s largest solar power plants – and the first on the Delmarva Peninsula.

This Saturday, June 19, at 10 a.m., the Historic Lewes Farmers’ Market will celebrate National Pollinator Week with demonstrations by Faith Kuehn from the Delaware Department of Agriculture and Dave Baues of Baues’ Busy Bees, a market vendor.

Gov. Jack Markell; Sen.

Delaware stream restoration projects and other successful initiatives that can guide conservation planning in the Chesapeake Watershed are featured in a new publication just released by The Conservation Fund, “A Sustainable Chesapeake – Better Models for Conservation.”

Against the backdrop of the growing Cherry Island landfill, Gov. Jack Markell signed legislation on June 8 that aims to make statewide universal recycling a reality.

The Freeman Stage will feature the musical “It’s Not Mean to be Green,” based on the book by Jamie Kleman, on June 19 at 10 a.m. The show is free and open to all ages.

The University of Delaware School of Marine Science and Policy’s Ocean Currents Lecture Series will continue this month with a talk on wind energy. Delivering the lecture will be Nancy Targett, dean of UD’s College of Earth, Ocean and Environment (CEOE), and CEOE wind energy expert Jeremy Firestone.

The University of Delaware School of Marine Science and Policy’s Ocean Currents Lecture Series will continue this month with a talk on wind energy. Delivering the lecture will be Nancy Targett, dean of UD’s College of Earth, Ocean and Environment (CEOE), and CEOE wind energy expert Jeremy Firestone.

The 2010 Delaware farmers’ market season is in full swing. And, in fact, the town of Georgetown brings to 16 the total number of farmers’ markets this year, holding a ribbon cutting last Friday at the Sports-at-the-Beach Complex on Route 9 in Georgetown.

If the eyes are the window to the soul, then the feet must be the kitchen sink drain of the body, according to Michele Salisbury, who recently opened up Mind, Body and Sole in Bethany Beach.

Now beachgoers don’t have to wait until they get to Rehoboth Beach or Lewes, or even Bethany Beach or Fenwick Island, to get to a farmers’ market. Or, they can still hit all of them if they want, and one more. The new Georgetown Farmers’ Market is up and running, from now until the end of summer, right off of Route 9 in Georgetown.

Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) joined 16 other cosponsors and four sponsors, including Sens. Jeff Bingaman, Olympia Snowe, Mark Warner and Lindsey Graham, this week in introducing revised bipartisan legislation that they said would directly create an estimated 168,000 new jobs while promoting home energy efficiency.

The Delaware Department of Agriculture (DDA), the Delaware Nursery and Landscape Association (DNLA) and the University of Delaware (UD) have teamed up to develop a Native Plant Nurseries List. The list was developed to satisfy the increasing demand of consumers for native plants.

In a groundbreaking collaboration, Delmarva Power and a Harbeson-based renewable energy firm, Flexera Inc., have established a legal way to enable Delaware homeowners and businesses to sell solar energy back to the PJM Mid-Atlantic power grid.

The Center for the Inland Bays (CIB) has received a $98,000 grant from the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) and the Clean Water Advisory Council to begin implementation of stormwater retrofits for the Anchorage Canal drainage area. The grant will allow them to start the study, design, engineering and construction of a particular wet swale along South Pennsylvania Avenue in front of Sea Colony. It is just one of many projects proposed for the area. Several other retrofit projects in the area have been proposed, with different price tags attached.

Old Dominion Electric Cooperative (ODEC) recently announced that it is adding purchased power agreements from two additional renewable energy facilities to its portfolio of resources: a Pennsylvania wind project and a landfill gas generation project in Delaware.

The Delaware Department of Agriculture (DDA), the Delaware Nursery and Landscape Association (DNLA) and the University of Delaware (UD) have teamed up to develop a Native Plant Nurseries List. The list was developed to satisfy the increasing demand of consumers for native plants.

The Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) this week announced that water quality testing of Delaware’s guarded swimming beaches and nine freshwater ponds began May 10 and would continue through September.

The Historic Lewes Farmers Market will open for its fifth season on Saturday, May 29, (Memorial Day weekend) and run through Oct. 9. The market will be held at the Lewes Historical Society complex at the corner of West Third and Shipcarpenter streets.

“Universal recycling” will soon be a reality in the First State. The State House of Representatives approved legislation to create the program on May 11, sending it to the governor to be signed into law. Gov. Jack Markell has made the passage of the legislation a priority of his administration.