EPA Awards Three Environmental Merit Awards to Vermont Recipients | US EPA

October 12, 2022

BOSTON (Oct. 12, 2022) – At this time, the U.S. EPA acknowledged two people and one group in Vermont on the digital 2022 Environmental Advantage Awards ceremony. The awardees have been amongst 20 recipients throughout New England honored for contributing to bettering New England’s setting.

New England’s annual Environmental Advantage Awards are given to group leaders, scientists, authorities officers, enterprise leaders, colleges, and college students who signify totally different approaches, however a standard dedication to environmental safety.

“EPA is proud to acknowledge and congratulate Vermont awardees’, for his or her nice accomplishments and their continued efforts in the direction of combatting local weather change, bringing cleaner air and water to neighborhoods, and guaranteeing our underserved communities’ voices are being heard,” stated EPA New England Regional Administrator David W. Money. “Their ingenuity and dedication actually make a distinction in our New England communities.”

The Environmental Advantage Awards, that are given to individuals who have already taken motion, are awarded within the classes of particular person; enterprise (together with skilled organizations); native, state or federal authorities; and environmental, group, academia or nonprofit group. Additionally, every year EPA presents lifetime achievement awards for people. The 2022 Environmental Advantage Award Winners from Vermont listed by class are:

Lifetime Achievement

Lynn Rubinstein
Govt Director Northeast Recycling Council, Brattleboro

After 4 a long time devoted to useful resource conservation, Lynna Rubenstein will retire this 12 months, abandoning a legacy of labor that can have a long-lasting affect. For over 20 years, Lynn was government director of the Northeast Recycling Council, a nonprofit centered on lowering waste, recycling and composting, in addition to on environmentally preferable buying and lowering the toxicity of stable waste.

The council acquired many awards as Lynn expanded its attain by getting the participation of extra gamers and putting in greater than 100 initiatives. These initiatives aimed to recycle electronics; handle undesirable treatment; doc the connection of jobs to recycling, and encourage initiatives for recycling newsprint.

Lynn has been a trusted voice for the non-public recycling trade and authorities, fostering an setting the place trade and authorities can focus on widespread points and discover options. She co-founded many applications, together with the State Electronics Problem, Electronics Recycling Coordination Clearinghouse, and Authorities Recycling Demand Champions. Her associated shows, stories and articles are all accessible on the council’s web site.

An instance of Lynn’s dedication to conserving the council dynamic in a altering financial system and waste stream, she helped type a partnership in 2017 between the council and the Northeast Waste Administration Officers’ Affiliation.

Whereas Lynn is thought for her management of the Northeast Recycling Council, she additionally served as stable waste supervisor for Northampton; conservation director for Holyoke; mercury and electronics recycling program director on the College of Massachusetts; professor of land use administration; useful resource planner, and lawyer with the US Division of Justice.

All through her profession, Lynn pioneered progressive applications, cast connections, and raised the extent of regional cooperation throughout the Northeast. Lynn’s work has had a considerable affect that can final properly into the longer term.

Authorities

Kesha Ram-Hinsdale
State Senator, Montpelier

State Senator Kesha Ram-Hinsdale has promoted environmental justice for over a decade. Kesha wrote a invoice in 2007 that tied financial and racial justice to environmental justice, which she labored to introduce as a university senior. In 2009 Kesha grew to become the youngest state legislator within the nation and the primary individual of colour elected to signify Burlington. After serving as a legislator, Kesha led group engagement efforts that introduced collectively teachers, activists, non-profit leaders, and group companions who sought to reply the query, “What does Environmental Justice appear to be in Vermont?” and to craft coverage based mostly on the testimony of those that have been systematically excluded from the mainstream environmental motion.

Starting in 2019, Kesha and her companions in a rural EJ challenge held conversations in overburdened and underserved communities. As facilitator, Kesha requested about individuals’ high quality of life, and the way they needed the state to answer environmental and well being crises. Throughout the pandemic, the challenge held 17 digital conversations with 77 individuals, drawing on established relationships with members of the Bhutanese Nepali, Somali Bantu, migrant farmworker, senior, rural, deaf/exhausting of listening to, disabled, and cell house communities. This led to Vermont’s first ever EJ Coverage, which handed this 12 months, and a community of group liaisons that could be a mannequin for group engagement.

Enterprise

GlobalFoundries, Essex

The GlobalFoundries Vermont Facility, generally known as FAB9, manufactures semiconductor chips for world telecommunications and shopper electronics markets. To make semiconductors, power, water, chemical compounds, and gases are wanted. The corporate’s World Environmental Well being and Security Coverage focuses on lowering power, water use, chemical use, and waste technology. When evaluating useful resource conservation initiatives, FAB9 makes use of the ideas of the waste administration hierarchy, with supply discount the popular strategy. Tasks that use fewer chemical compounds and nonhazardous alternate options, or discover reuse alternatives, additionally lower your expenses and enhance operations.

The FAB9 photolithography staff, which is answerable for a key course of in producing semiconductors, has put in place 4 initiatives that diminished solvent use by 70,468 liters, saving $652,354 a 12 months whereas lowering chemical dealing with and waste shipments. The staff set the usual to be “greatest in school” for photochemical use and the Vermont web site was acknowledged by a number of tooling suppliers for driving down solvent use with out impacting course of necessities. GlobalFoundries coordinates an annual workshop that shares data and initiatives with photolithography groups worldwide. Final 12 months, after particulars of its initiatives have been shared, three factories dedicated to putting in solvent reductions.

Ira Leighton “In Service to States” Annual Award

Yearly, one particular person in New England is chosen to obtain the Ira Leighton “In Service to States” Environmental Advantage Award. It’s a tribute to our long-time colleague and buddy, Ira Leighton, who handed away in 2013, after serving 41 years on the U.S. EPA. Ira’s dedication and keenness for shielding the setting was evident to all who knew him. He was a relentless presence in New England, a pressure who took concepts and made them actionable duties that resulted in measurable enhancements. At this time, the 2022 award was offered to Melanie Loyzim of Maine.

Melanie Loyzim
Maine Division of Environmental Safety

Melanie Loyzim, Commissioner of the Maine Division of Environmental Safety, has been a pacesetter over the previous twenty years in selling environmental safety and sustaining a viable financial system.

For extra data on EPA’s Environmental Advantage Awards, together with a video of at this time’s award ceremony, go to: EPA New England Environmental Advantage Awards