Author: Roland Mcconnell

For several days around Christmas 2022 last year, South Carolinians felt record cold temperatures. The three major utilities that serve the state — Dominion, Duke and Santee Cooper — struggled to provide enough electricity to meet customer demand. From Dec. 24-25, the utilities had to impose rolling blackouts on their systems. “We (utilities) failed,” Keller Kissam, president of Dominion Energy South Carolina told a special legislative committee Oct. 18. At that same hearing, Duke Energy Carolinas President Michael Callahan bluntly told lawmakers, “We need power, and we need a lot of it, and we need to take action today.” Utility…

More than 100 farms around New York will receive funding through the Climate Resilient Farming Grant Program with the aim to help address sustainability needs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Gov. Kathy Hochul announced that nearly $16 million will be allocated to 116 farms through county Soil and Water Conservation Districts. “New York’s agricultural industry is often faced with severe challenges associated with our changing climate, from flooding to droughts that impact their crops and their livelihoods,” Hochul said in a statement. The funding will help farms implement projects in three different categories: livestock management for methane reduction, adaptation and…

Volvo Group has been selected as the winning bidder in the Proterra sweepstakes. Proterra Inc. and Proterra Operating Co. Inc. are in a voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy process in the U.S. Volvo Group has been selected as the winning bidder in an auction for the business and assets of the Proterra Powered business unit at a purchase price of $210 million, the release stated. In August, Proterra Inc. (Nasdaq: PTRA) announced that the company is taking action to “maximize the value of its business and enhance the potential of each of its product lines,” according to a Proterra news release.…

Three members of the Connecticut Interstate Fire Crew are responding to North Carolina to help fight wildfires, according to the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP). The firefighters departed from the DEEP Eastern District Headquarters early Sunday morning. The crew represents the latest team of personnel and resources sent from Connecticut on a multi-week deployment to assist with national and Canadian wildfire responses, according to DEEP. “These firefighters who uproot their lives to travel far from home and battle wildfires make us immensely proud,” DEEP Commissioner Katie Dykes said. “We are so grateful for their courage and service as…

Reports of racism on the set of The Real Housewives of New York City trickled out two years ago, centering on alleged comments by housewife Ramona Singer that prompted a Bravo investigation and led in part to a franchise overhaul. Eboni K. Williams, the show’s first Black cast member, claims she tried to quit the show during that season. Williams told Vanity Fair, in a broad report on attempts to unionize Bravo stars, that she wanted to leave on November 6, 2020, and had a meeting with production on November 9. In the meeting, she said, producers told her, “Listen, what you’re giving us is exactly what…

Rome (16/11 – 57) Sri Lanka is mired in a deep political and economic crisis and the country’s then President Rajapaksa has flown out of the country, days after a huge crowd of protesters stormed his residence in July 2022. Protesters for months have demanded the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, whose government has been blamed for chronic mismanagement of the country’s finances. The island nation of 22 million people has suffered months of lengthy blackouts, acute food and fuel shortages, and galloping inflation in its most painful downturn on record. Here is how the crisis unfolded: April 1: State of emergency Rajapaksa declares a temporary state of emergency, giving security forces sweeping powers to arrest and…

The Rhode Island Foundation is partnering with Trinity Rep and the Rhode Island Community Food Bank to inspire a spirit of giving going into the holiday season. The Foundation will match every donation the public makes to the theater during its 2023 run of “A Christmas Carol” with an equal grant to the Food Bank, up to a total of $60,000. The goal is to help the Food Bank to keep its warehouse stocked for member agencies like the Community Baptist Church Meal Site, the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center Meal Site, the Salvation Army Newport Corps’ Food…

Frankfurt (11/09 – 20) Two international human rights organizations have called on the Tajikistan government to immediately release jailed lawyer and human rights activist Manuchehr Kholiknazarov, as well as other activists and journalists. The International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR) and the international non-profit organization CIVICUS, which bills itself as “a global alliance aimed at strengthening the action of citizens and civil society around the world,” in their message published specially on the eve of Independence Day, September 8, focus on the fact that Tajik human rights activist and civil society activist Manuchehr Kholiknazarov was falsely sentenced to a long…

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) defended the decision for the FBI’s new headquarters to be in the state after the move stirred up some controversy, notably among Virginia lawmakers. FBI Director Christopher Wray told agency staff he was concerned about a potential conflict of interest within the process used by the Biden administration and the General Services Administration (GSA) to choose Greenbelt, Md., as the agency’s new headquarters. Wray told his staff they previously agreed for the new headquarters to be in Springfield, Va., but an “exceedingly rare” move by a senior executive changed the location to Greenbelt, which is…

Rogue Space Systems, a three-year-old startup developing small satellites for in-orbit servicing, launched its first demonstrator Nov. 11 on the SpaceX Transporter-9 rideshare mission. SpaceX launched more than 100 satellites on a Falcon 9 rocket that lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Rogue’s spacecraft, named Barry-1, will test the company’s on-board computing software and its ability to aggregate data from multiple sensors and process that data in real time, Rogue Space said. The data compute platform was developed with funding from the U.S. Space Force’s Orbital Prime program. The pocket-size Barry-1 payload was built on a platform…