Offshore wind power breaks ground in the U.S.

Happy Sunday!

Apologies for missing last week’s issue of Voyage Green News. Travel sometimes means we are flexible with our scheduled commitments. 😆 

For anyone with us for the first time, welcome to Voyage Green News! We provide a weekly dose of news and inspiration for a sustainable life. 💚 

♻️ This week’s sustainability news

Offshore wind power milestone in America

What’s happening: Construction has started on an offshore wind power plant at the 73-acre South Brooklyn Marine Terminal. Equinor, an energy company from Norway, will use the facility to handle large wind turbines for the Atlantic Ocean. By 2026, this facility will be one of the biggest centres for offshore wind energy, an important and growing industry in the United States. Workers will build and maintain the towers, blades, and parts for offshore wind projects, starting with Equinor’s 810-megawatt Empire Wind 1 project near Long Island. Underwater cables will link this wind farm to a new substation at the Brooklyn terminal, providing clean electricity for 500,000 homes.

Why it’s happening: In recent years, high interest rates, supply chain problems, and local opposition have slowed down or stopped offshore wind projects in New York and the Eastern Seaboard. However, some companies are still making progress on important projects. In March, Ørsted opened the 132-MW South Fork Wind Farm near Long Island, which is America's first large-scale offshore wind farm. The United States has set up at least 240 megawatts of offshore wind power near New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Virginia. This is about 1 percent of the Biden administration's goal to install 30 gigawatts of offshore wind power by the end of the decade.

Why it’s important: This progress could be at risk if Donald Trump, who strongly opposes wind energy, becomes president again in November. For now, President Joe Biden is trying to grow the country's offshore wind energy by leasing new areas in the Pacific Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Gulf of Maine. Offshore wind is very important for reducing carbon emissions and meeting the growing energy needs of data centers, factories, and electric homes and cars. Nearly 40% of Americans live near the coast, where there isn't much land for big energy projects, but there is a lot of open ocean. A new report by the Sierra Club says that building 9 GW of offshore wind near Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island would help the region meet its climate goals and save New England residents about $630 million each year on electricity. This is mainly because it would reduce their need for fossil fuel gas and heating oil during winter, when energy prices usually increase.

📖 Read the full article: Long-awaited offshore wind hub breaks ground in Brooklyn

Live longer and help save the planet with your diet

What’s happening: A diet which tackles unhealthy eating and environmental destruction has been linked to a significantly lower risk of permanent death. Known as the ‘planetary health diet’, the first large-scale analysis of the diet’s effect on people who followed it closely found they had a lower chance of every leading cause of death, including cancer, heart disease and lung disease.

Why it’s happening: The diet was first published in the medical journal The Lancet five years ago. Researchers used data relating to 206,000 men and women in the United States from long-running studies recording what people ate. They then scored their diets based on how closely they followed the planetary health diet.

Why it’s important: The ten per cent of people who most closely followed the diet had almost a third lower risk of premature death than those in the bottom ten per cent. They also had a diet with 29 per cent lower greenhouse gas emissions. The planetary health diet is ‘flexitarian’ rather than vegetarian, with most protein recommended to come from nuts, beans, and lentils, with a recommended less than 50g a day each of eggs, fish, meat, and sugar. If people followed the diet globally, it would result in more than a doubling of the amount of healthy food such as fruit, vegetables, pulses, and nuts being consumed, and a reduction of 50% in the amount of red meat.

📖 Read the full article: Planet-first diet cuts risk of early death by nearly a third, study says

🌐 Travel to Chiapas, Mexico

See the captivating Cascadas Roberto Barrios

Some of the most beautiful waterfalls we’ve ever seen: We love exploring waterfalls, but these ones were extra special. Staying with a local family nearby made the experience even better.

😇 People doing great things

Slowing deforestation in Indonesia

Women ranger teams go on patrol: Since January 2020, the rangers travel through the jungle to complete important tasks. They map and check the trees, list local plants, and help farmers plant new trees. They also measure and mark trees, putting ribbons on them to stop people from cutting them down. If they see anyone in the forest, they talk to them about why the jungle is important for their village and give them seeds to plant. The low-key methods the women use, instead of direct confrontation, have been successful in getting people to change their habits. This has resulted in more wildlife being active and denser tree cover.

⭐️ Weekly inspiration

Coldplay exceeds their carbon reduction target

Reduced carbon footprint while touring: By 59% compared to their previous tour, via creative methods including kinetic dance floors that generate electricity, recyclable LED wristbands, and the band travelling by train.

World’s largest solar farm connected to grid

In the desert of northwestern Xinjiang, China: It will generate 6.09 billion kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity annually; power for about 2.03 million EVs.

New fast chargers for EVs rolling off the production line

Charge most EVs to 80% in just 15 minutes: American company Flo are ramping up production to get more of them available across North America.

Wombats assist other animals during bushfires

Their burrows provide refuge: Paper reveals how fifty-six different vertebrate species were observed using wombat burrows.

Restaurant workers fight back against heat exhaustion

Walking out and unionizing: Protecting themselves from record-breaking summer temperatures and heat waves making some workplaces intolerable.

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