UPDATE 8/2/2020 2:30pm:

Hurricane Isaias has just been downgraded to Tropical Storm Isaias.

The storm has shifted slightly west and is now expected to pass right through the heart of North Carolina:

Original Article 8/1/2020 10:30am:

Governor Roy Cooper has just declared a state of emergency for North Carolina ahead of Hurricane Isaias’ expected landfall on Monday.

The Hurricane’s current forecast is showing the storm increasing in intensity over the next 24 hours and is now expected to reach North Carolina as early as Monday morning, making its greatest impact Monday night into Tuesday. Our state is already seeing extremely high risk of deadly rip currents all along the coast.

“A hurricane during a pandemic is double trouble, but the state has been carefully preparing for this scenario so we can do our best to keep people safe from the weather, as well as the virus,” the governer said in yesterday’s briefing.

You can watch the entire media briefing here:

“Although the track and arrival of the hurricane could still change, now is the time for North Carolinians to prepare,” said Governor Cooper. “Hurricane preparations will be different given the COVID-19 pandemic, and families need to keep that in mind as they get ready.”

Officials are reminding all residents in Atlantic Coast states to prepare.

In case of a power outage, make sure to have the following emergency items stocked in your home;

• Car charger for cell phones and other devices
• Clean drinking water (recommended 1 gallon per person per day, minimum three days)
• Flashlights 
• Batteries: Extra batteries for all of your devices
• Weather radio/clock
• Non-perishable food
• First aid kit

We will continue to update this article as this storm develops. 

Smithfield Foods, in partnership with Duke Energy and OptimaBio, LLC, recently turned on their revolutionary new renewable natural gas (RNG) system at its Tar Heel, N.C. pork processing facility, the largest pork processing facility in the world (currently processing over 30,000 hogs each day).

The new RNG system at the facility will power thousands of homes by turning the pig’s bowel movements into usable “BioGas”. The $14 million project will reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions 25% by 2025 and will produce roughly 140,000 dekatherms of RNG per year that will be transported to natural gas plants and used to generate electricity for consumers.

“This project brings to life all three of our company’s guiding principles – Responsibility, Operational Excellence, and Innovation,” said Kenneth M. Sullivan, president and chief executive officer for Smithfield Foods. “For the first time, we are creating renewable energy from the biogas generated in our wastewater treatment system and using it to power local communities. With the help of our partners, we are producing additional value for our company and our neighbors—a concept that is ingrained in our culture.”

To date, this is one of Smithfield’s largest renewable energy projects involving wastewater, and its first in North Carolina. Smithfield also has “wastewater-to-energy” projects at its Milan, Mo.; Grayson, Ky.; and Sioux Falls, S.D. facilities, which are used to power their modified steam boilers.

The company’s Tar Heel, N.C., project utilizes a gas upgrading and injection system operated by OptimaBio, LLC, a bioenergy project developer, which leverages the facility’s three million gallon-per-day wastewater treatment system to collect and clean biogas through an existing on-site digester and convert it into RNG.

“We are proud to partner with Smithfield on this project, which has far-reaching and positive impacts for the environment, the local community, and industries that are key to the state’s economy,” said Mark Maloney, CEO and Founder at OptimaBio, LLC. “We’re helping diversify and strengthen North Carolina’s renewable energy portfolio through this endeavor.”

Once converted, the RNG is injected into the Piedmont Natural Gas system, and then transported to Duke Energy to produce electricity. This project will help Duke Energy satisfy state swine waste-to-energy mandates under the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Portfolio Standard law in North Carolina. Under this law, Duke Energy must generate 0.20% of its retail sales from swine waste by 2024.

“At Duke Energy, we are seeking innovative and cleaner energy solutions. Buying the output from Smithfield’s renewable natural gas project will allow us to expand our diverse generation mix in North Carolina,” said Stephen De May, Duke Energy’s North Carolina president. “This project is creating safe and affordable energy that customers can rely on.”

In addition to creating renewable energy at its facilities, Smithfield is implementing projects on its farms that transform manure into RNG. These projects capture methane from manure, and clean and convert it into RNG, which is then injected into local natural gas distribution systems for homes and businesses. In the next decade, Smithfield is implementing “manure-to-energy” projects in at least six states including Arizona, California, Missouri, North Carolina, Utah, and Virginia.

Duke Energy and Buncombe County have just agreed to team up to build the state’s first solar power plant on a retired landfill in the town of Woodfin, North Carolina.

The power company will own and operate the 5-megawatt solar power plant located on the old landfill – near Interstate 26 and the French Broad River, and will help meet the county’s 2030 renewable energy goals.

“Working with local communities is critical to advancing our clean energy plan,” said Stephen De May, Duke Energy’s North Carolina president. “This project is an innovative example of how to creatively repurpose land to advance community goals.”

The plant is expected to come online in the second half of 2021 and will produce enough energy annually to power about 1,000 homes and businesses.

“We are excited to see the solar farm on the county’s retired landfill moving forward. This is a great way to make productive use of land that cannot be used for many other purposes while helping the county meet its goal of using 100% renewable energy by 2030,” notes Board of Commission Chairman Brownie Newman. 

Sourcing its renewables from local generation was identified as a top priority during the county’s renewable energy community engagement process. This project will allow the county to reach nearly 20% of its renewable goal with locally sourced clean energy.  

Background

The landfill stopped operating in 1996. To avoid disturbing the ground covering, the solar racking system will be built on concrete blocks instead of being anchored into the ground. Underground cabling will be kept to a minimum. Check out video footage of the site.

The project will be located on 25 acres and will be connected to the Duke Energy power grid. Under a 25-year agreement, the county will lease the land to Duke Energy. For Buncombe County to include the solar power generated toward its 100% renewable energy goal, it will own the Renewable Energy Certificates (REC) from the Duke Energy power plant to offset the energy used from the county’s operations.

The solar project is just one of many Duke Energy investments in the region. The company recently finished construction of the $817 million Asheville Combined Cycle Station, which became fully operational April 5, 2020. The new station replaced a 344-megawatt two-unit coal plant at the Asheville site, which retired on Jan. 29, 2020.

The company’s efforts in the region also include increased participation in energy efficiency and conservation programs to reduce energy usage, a battery storage project in Asheville and a solar and battery microgrid system in neighboring Madison County.

More details about the landfill solar plant are in the company’s filing with the North Carolina Utilities Commission.

Three eastern North Carolina counties now live with 30 million more chickens and turkeys than they did eight years ago, according to a new investigation by the Environmental Working Group and Waterkeeper Alliance.

The groups’ report and map show that, from 2012 to 2019, the estimated number of chickens and turkeys in North Carolina’s Duplin, Sampson and Robeson counties swelled from 83 million to 113 million, a 36 percent increase. This is more than twice the rate of growth in the state’s other 97 counties.

The growing population of chickens and turkeys in the three counties could produce one million tons of waste each year – almost a fifth of all estimated poultry waste statewide. That is 4,500 times the weight of the Statue of Liberty.

“North Carolina’s poultry industry is running amok,” said Soren Rundquist, EWG’s director of spatial analysis and one of the report’s authors. “The reckless growth of poultry operations, especially in the same three counties that already housed more than half of the swine in the entire state, is alarming.”

In the 2010 census, 57 percent of residents of the three counties identified as Black, American Indian or Alaska Native, or one of several other non-white categories – almost twice the state average. Thirty-eight percent of Robeson County residents identified as American Indian, the highest proportion in the state. Duplin County was nearly 21 percent Hispanic or Latino, the highest share in the state, and Sampson County was third, with about 17 percent.

“The unchecked growth of poultry operations in North Carolina comes with a steep cost for the state’s Black, Native American and Latino people,” said Will Hendrick, Waterkeeper Alliance senior attorney. “Yet state policy makers continue to abdicate their responsibility to manage the meat industry and its impacts on residents’ water, air and quality of life.”

The report’s interactive map, updated since its original publication in 2016, shows the location of every industrial swine and poultry operation in the state, with details about the number of animals and estimated amount of waste they could potentially produce each year.

Statewide, the number of chickens and turkeys increased by 90 million birds since 2012, meaning one in three of all birds added were in Duplin, Sampson or Robeson county. North Carolina’s more than 4,800 concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, now hold more than 538 million chickens and turkeys that could produce over 5 million tons of manure each year. That’s on top of 8.7 million hogs potentially generating 9.2 billion gallons of liquified waste and sludge a year.

None of North Carolina’s hog or poultry waste is treated. Poultry waste is stored in piles, and swine waste is often pumped into enormous open-air pits.

The state has known for years that the risks of living near swine CAFOs are disproportionately borne by Black, Native American and Latino residents. In 2017, an Environmental Protection Agency review of a civil rights suit that alleged discriminatory impacts of state permitting of hog operations led the agency to express “deep concern” about discrimination against North Carolina’s African Americans, Native Americans and Latinos.

The suit was settled in 2018, and the number of hog CAFOs has held roughly stable. Meanwhile, the state has allowed the poultry industry to add one operation after another, with almost no regulatory oversight, in the same counties already most affected by hog operations.

“The massive growth of poultry operations in the Lumber River Watershed over the last two years has been devastating,” said Jefferson Currie II, the Lumber Riverkeeper and a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina, most of whom live in Robeson County. “All this is made worse by the fact that many of these CAFOs are in floodplains, putting vulnerable Native communities at even greater risk.”

Thousands of CAFOs are located in the state’s coastal plain, which is vulnerable to hurricanes and other severe storms. Numerous facilities were overcome by flood waters during and after hurricanes Matthew and Florence.

The NC Department of Health and Human Services has just reported the largest 1-day increase in the number of deaths caused by COVID-19 and the highest number of COVID-19 patients currently hospitalized across our state.

Over the past 24 hours, a total of 45 COVID-19 deaths were reported, increasing the total number of COVID-19 deaths in our state to 1,865. There are also now 1,291 people currently hospitalized with the COVID-19 disease, 52 more than yesterday.

Here is the complete data set for COVID-19 in North Carolina:

Please be sure to wear a face mask whenever you are in public and to wash your hands and use hand sanitizer often.

Cloth face coverings may help prevent the spread of #COVID19 when they are widely used in public settings. When you wear a face covering, you help protect those around you. When others wear one, they help protect people around them, including you. https://t.co/jkWwZTxyhs pic.twitter.com/5K7ySDEpG0

— CDC (@CDCgov) July 28, 2020

As COVID-19 continue to increase across our state, our leaders have begun to take new steps to slow the spread.

Governor Cooper just enacted one such measure by signing Executive Order 153  “RESTRICTING LATE NIGHT SERVICE OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES”. This makes sense since the country has seen an increase in DUI’s all across.

The new order essentially forbids the sale of alcoholic drinks in restaurants, breweries, wineries, and distilleries anytime after 11 pm, and will take effect on Friday, July 31.

“Slowing the spread of this virus requires targeted strategies that help lower the risk of transmission,” said Governor Cooper. “This will be particularly important as colleges and universities are scheduled to start, bringing people all over the country to our state. We have seen case numbers increase among younger people, and prevention is critical to slowing the spread of the virus.”

What do you think about the new order?