Applications are due Thursday for grants to pay for onshore facilities or pump-out boats.

Journal file photo / Andrew Dickerman

Marina operators, yacht clubs and communities have until Thursday to apply for federal grants to help pay for shoreside boat pump facilities or pump-out boats.

The state Department of Environmental Management is offering grants of up to $15,000 for each shoreside facility and up to $56,250 for each pump-out boat. Both grant categories require a 25-percent match from the applicants.

A total of $200,000 is available for the grants from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Rhode Island has prohibited boaters from discharging sewage into Rhode Island waters since 1998. That is when Rhode Island became the first state in the country to get a statewide “no discharge” designation from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Boat sewage can introduce bacteria, pathogens and excess nutrients to marine waters. Such discharges can trigger algae blooms, which in turn consume oxygen needed by other marine life.

So far, the DEM has distributed nearly $800,000 in Clean Vessel Act money to help pay for 12 pump-out boats and 53 shoreside facilities. But with an estimated 54,000 boats in use on Rhode Island waters each year, the agency believes more pump-outs are necessary.

Grant applications may be obtained by going to www.dem.ri.gov and clicking on “Topics,” and then “Sewage Treatment,” and then “Marine Pumpouts.” For more information, call Joseph Migliore at (401) 222-3961, ext. 7258 or write to joseph.migliore@dem.ri.gov

Kayak access due on Ninigret Pond

A new accessway for those wishing to kayak or canoe on Ninigret Pond should be ready for use by this summer.

The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service just closed the public comment period on its plans to build a 650-foot gravel driveway within the Ninigret National Wildlife Refuge. The driveway would allow people to drive close to the shores of the pond and unload canoes or kayaks. They would have to return their vehicles to the existing parking lot.

In the same area, the service plans to remove a quarter-acre of invasive phragmites and install an 18-inch culvert to improve the tidal flow of a small pond near the parking lot.

Finally, it plans to remove and revegetate a 525-foot administrative road that runs nearby.

The work is being done in partnership with the Town of Charlestown.

The service says it expects the refuge will get 14,000 additional visits annually by those using the new boat launch.

R.I. joins 15 states in clean air appeal

Attorney General Patrick Lynch joined 15 other states last week in urging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to comply with a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in April that established the EPA’s responsibility to regulate greenhouse gases under the federal Clean Air Act.

Rhode Island was one of 12 states that filed the lawsuit that resulted in the Supreme Court ruling. The ruling allows the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas.

“The EPA itself set a self-imposed deadline of the end of 2007 to formally respond to last year’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA,” Lynch said in a statement. “We’re almost a full month into the new year and the promised proceedings have failed to materialize.”

The City of New York and the mayor and city council of Baltimore also are parties to the lawsuit.

With the EPA refusing to regulate carbon dioxide, Lynch also joined several other states in expressing concerns over contruction of a new coal-fired power plant in South Carolina. It is the fourth proposed power plant Lynch has commented on since 2006.

Nominees sought for EPA awards

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is looking for nominations of individuals and groups to recognize with its annual Environmental Merit Awards.

Nominations will be accepted until Friday for four categories of awards: individual, business or professional, governmental activities or community and nonprofit achievements.

The awards have been given out annually since the EPA was created in 1970. Past recipients have included scientists, community activists, business people and public officials.

For nomination forms and more information, go to www.epa.gov/ne/ra/ema

Learn to manage your woodlands

Workshops on woodland management are scheduled during the next several weeks by the Rhode Island Forest Conservators Organization.

The workshops will be from 8:30 a.m. to noon on Feb. 9, 16 and 23 and March 1.

The workshops will include locating boundaries, working with maps, soils, wildlife habitat, harvesting timber and chain saw safety. The Feb. 9 workshop includes a session on estate planning for woodland owners.

At the end of the series, there will be an optional field trip to the organization’s demonstration woodlot in Foster.

Preregistration is required, along with a fee of $15 for each workshop or $55 for the series. For more information, call (401) 568-3421 or go to www.rifco.org

Bills would protect open space, lakes

Two pieces of legislation have been filed in the early weeks of the General Assembly that could have environmental consequences.

Rep. Jan P. Malik, D-Barrington, chair of the House Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, has submitted a bill that would keep abutters from claiming land that was intended to be set aside for open space. Malik cited precedents in which property owners cited adverse possession to try to claim properties whose owners thought they were preserved for open space.

Also, Sen. Beatrice A. Lanzi, D-Cranston, has sponsored legislation requiring the state Department of Environmental Management to test all of Rhode Island’s 250 lakes and ponds for toxins on a regular basis.

Lanzi said she is concerned about dangerous lawn chemicals and cleaning products seeping into lakes and ponds. Her bill was referred to the Senate Committee on Environment and Agriculture.

The Environmental Journal is a listing of brief news items about the actions of individuals, organizations and businesses that affect the air we breathe, the water we drink and the landscape that surrounds us. If you have comments or suggestions, please contact environment reporter Peter B. Lord at (401) 277-8036, or by e-mail at plord@projo.com or by writing him, care of The Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902.