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Stefanie Penn Spear is the founder, executive director and editor of EcoWatch. She has been publishing environmental news for more than two decades. Spear works to unite the voice of the grassroots environmental movement and mobilize millions of people to engage in democracy to protect human health and the environment. She seeks to motivate individuals to become engaged in their community, adopt sustainable practices and support strong environmental policy.

For more than six years, EcoWatch has been servicing the sustainability community of Ohio through its bimontly newspaper EcoWatch Journal, with a readership of more than 100,000 per issue. In 2011, EcoWatch in partnership with Waterkeeper Alliance expanded its services to promote the work of more than 1,000 grassroots environmental organizations worldwide through an online news service website EcoWatch.org.

Spear is president of Expedite Renewable Energy, a company that develops solar and wind projects in Ohio and helps companies through the many steps of investing in renewable energy. She works on energy policy on the local, state and federal level to help transition the U.S. to relying on cleaner, renewable sources of power.

Spear chairs the Green Commission for the Village of Moreland Hills, and co-chairs the Advanced Energy Generation committee for Sustainable Cleveland 2019.  She is on the advisory board for GreenCityBlueLake Institute, Tri-C’s Green Academy and Center for Sustainability, and Sunflower Solutions.

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  • NPR Takes a Deeper Look into Fracking Boom
    05-21-2012
    Last week, NPR took a deeper look at the natural gas boom in the U.S. The special series, “The Fracking Boom: Missing Answers,” questions what the gas boom is doing to the air and water in communities where fracking has become a household name…
  • River Rally Rocks the Planet
    05-14-2012
    There’s no better example of the warriors working toward a sustainable future than the 700 people who attended River Rally…
  • Hundreds Protest Coal Exporting at Rally with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
    05-07-2012
    “Oregon and Washington leaders are faced with a choice between healthy communities with a clean energy future or becoming tied to trafficking coal, the most toxic fuel on earth,” stated Robert F. Kennedy, Jr…
  • Pivotal Figure in Fracking Debate Tumbles from Summit of His Own Ambition
    05-01-2012
    According to Waterkeeper Alliance President Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., “Among the environmental community and the more responsible gas industry players, we found a widespread mistrust of Aubrey McClendon…
  • Will BP Finally Be Held Accountable?
    04-25-2012
    On April 24, BP engineer Kurt Mix was arrested on charges of intentionally destroying evidence concerning the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon disaster…
  • Sign Petition to Enforce Strict Regulations for Off-Shore Oil Drilling
    04-20-2012
    We all remember the horrific images of the Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico on April 20, 2010, that killed 11 oil rig workers, injured 17 others and released about 4.9 million barrels of crude oil for three months into the ocean…
  • Framing Judi Bari
    04-11-2012
    The new documentary Who Bombed Judi Bari? shows how activists can take on the powers that be and win, though at a great cost…
  • Four Eco-Documentaries that will Fuel Your Fire
    04-01-2012
    I encourage you to take the time to watch these outstanding films in hopes that these documentaries will fuel your fire and enthusiasm to work toward a sustainable future…
  • Dirty Energy
    03-22-2012
    This year, EcoWatch is sponsoring Dirty Energy, a 90-minute documentary that tells the untold story of the disastrous effects that the Deepwater explosion and oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico had, and is still having, on the economy and people of America’s Gulf Coast…
  • It’s Easy Being Green
    03-16-2012
    One of my favorite events of the year is right around the corner—the Cleveland International Film Festival from March 22 to April 1…
  • Cape Spin—An American Power Struggle
    03-09-2012
    I’ve been following the Cape Wind project for years, but this film provided an inside glimpse of what this community has been going through for more than a decade…
  • Profligate Use of Fossil Fuels Threatens Humankind
    02-27-2012
    Human activity has become so great that our profligate use of fossil fuels is altering the chemistry of the atmosphere with potentially catastrophic effects for all of human kind…
  • Will Natural Gas Become the ‘Achilles’ Heel’ of Our Country?
    02-15-2012
    Frustrations are running high as our country continues to run our energy policy as business as usual. Sooner or later, push will come to shove. I just hope that when it does, our country will have taken the right steps forward to truly embrace the sustainable energy future we are capable of creating…
  • Grassroots Advocacy at Its Best
    02-03-2012
    The choice is ours. Do we want to continue to pollute the planet, kill ourselves and have no regard for anything wild, or will more people join the grassroots environmental movement and take a stand against corporations that put profits first?
  • American-Made Energy—the Good, the Bad and the Ugly
    01-25-2012
    President Obama’s State of the Union address could perhaps best be described as the good, the bad and the ugly. Obama wants to generate American-made energy…
  • Keystone XL Rejected and Lunch with Secretary of Energy Chu
    01-19-2012
    Between Obama denying the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline and having lunch with U.S. Secretary of Energy Dr. Steven Chu…
  • EPA Weighs in on New York Fracking Plan
    01-14-2012
    The U.S. EPA found that the emerging plan to regulate natural gas drilling in the gas-rich Marcellus Shale needs to go further to safeguard drinking water…
  • Fukushima Fallout
    01-12-2012
    When I began editing Harvey Wasserman’s Insights article for the EcoWatch.org site, I had great difficulty getting past the first sentence…
  • Ohioans Speak Out Against Fracking
    01-11-2012
    Thanks to everyone who attended yesterdays rally to tell our elected officials that creating jobs at the expense of human health and the environment is not sustainable…
  • Fracking, Keystone XL, Mountaintop Removal and More
    01-09-2012
    On Jan. 10 at 1 p.m. on the west lawn of the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus, Ohio, concerned citizens from all over the state will gather to ask Gov. Kasich to impose an indefinite moratorium…
  • Obama’s Offshore Oil Drilling Plan
    01-05-2012
    The Obama admin-istration has proposed an offshore oil drilling plan for the next five years that would allow drilling in the pristine Arctic Ocean and more drilling in the Gulf of Mexico before adequate safety standards are in effect…
  • Evidence Suggests Ohio Earthquake Caused by Fracking Wastewater Injection Well
    01-04-2012
    Won-Young Kim, a research professor of Seismology Geology at Columbia University who is advising the state of Ohio on the New Year’s Eve 4.0 magnitude earthquake…
  • Earthquakes, Fracking and Hope for the New Year
    01-02-2012
    Hope is a great way to start the new year. I starting off my new year with a sunrise paddle in the Sarasota Bay, a four-mile run on the beach and paddleboarding on the Gulf of Mexico…
  • Top Five Environmental Events of 2011
    12-29-2011
    This year certainly had its big eco-news events. From natural disasters that led to one of the worst nuclear meltdowns on record to an unprecedented assault on environmental protections and regulations in Congress, 2011 felt like wetook 10 steps backward on the protection of human health and the environment…
  • What’s for Dinner?
    12-29-2011
    I’m on vacation with my kids in Florida, visiting my parents. I’ve been coming to this same spot for more than two decades, and love soaking in the sun and running on the beach. More or less, the entire vacation is relaxing and a great way to recharge for the new year…
  • Greenhouse Gas Index Continues to Climb
    12-28-2011
    In November, NOAA’s AGGI, which measures the direct climate influence of many greenhouse gases such as carbon dixoide and methane, showed a continued steady upward trend that began with the Industrial Revolution of the 1880s…
  • Extreme Weather of November 2011
    12-26-2011
    Stay tuned this week as I review the year’s social, environmental and economic events that have impacted human health and the environment. I begin by reviewing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s…
  • Why I’m So Dedicated to Protecting the Health of the Planet
    12-22-2011
    I’m often asked what keeps me so dedicated to protecting the health of the planet. My typical response is that I know if more people were educated…
  • Renewable Rider Concludes 2,150-mile Keystone XL Tour
    12-21-2011
    Renewable Rider Tom Weis concludes his 10-week, 2,150-mile, Keystone XL “Tour of Resistance” along the six-state path of the proposed route of the TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline…
  • Army Corps OKs Access to Alaskan Oil Reserve
    12-20-2011
    Conoco Phillips was issued a key federal permit (under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act) by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Dec. 19, to begin working on the first-ever commercial oil well…
  • House Stalls Extension Tax Cut—How will it Impact Keystone XL?
    12-19-2011
    The House Republican leader John A. Boehner (R-OH) on Sunday flatly rejected a short-term, bipartisan Senate measure to extend a payroll tax break…
  • Senate Fast-Tracks Keystone Pipeline, Fails to Extend Renewable Energy Tax Credit
    12-18-2011
    In approving a payroll tax cut extension plan in an 89-10 vote on Saturday, the U.S. Senate included a provision that requires President Obama to make a decision within 60 days on whether to move forward with the proposed Keystone XL pipeline project…
  • Will Congress Extend the Renewable Energy Tax Credit?
    12-16-2011
    Three years ago I would have never believed that in December 2011 our country would still be running without a federal energy policy. It has been clear for so long that we need to transition to relying on cleaner, renewable sources of power and pass legislation that mandates a renewable portfolio standard…
  • World’s Appetite for Coal Continues to Grow
    12-15-2011
    According to the International Energy Agency (IEA) in a new annual publication, Medium-Term Coal Market Report 2011, released Dec. 13, global demand for coal will continue to expand aggressively over the next five years despite public calls in many countries to…
  • The Big Fix
    12-14-2011
    On April 22, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig sank into the Gulf of Mexico creating the worst oil spill in history—killing 11 men and injuring 17 others. Until the oil well was capped on Sept. 19, 2010, 205 million gallons of crude oil and more than 1.8 million gallons of chemical dispersant…
  • Stop the Keystone XL Pipeline
    12-13-2011
    It has been a very active fall in the fight to stop the Keystone XL pipeline. Thanks to the work of Bill McKibben, 350.org and Tar Sands Action, tens of thousands of people have been mobilized to stop tar sands oil from being piped from Canada to Texas…
  • Noble Causes Everyone Should Support
    12-01-2011
    This Thanksgiving, the grassroots environmental movement had many reasons to be thankful. November brought many victories including the delays on the Keystone XL pipeline and fracking the Delaware River Basin…
  • EcoWatch and Waterkeeper Launch News Website
    11-02-2011
    On Oct. 27, EcoWatch and Waterkeeper Alliance hosted a public event along the Cuyahoga River to celebrate the launch of their nationwide news service website with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., founder and president of Waterkeeper Alliance, as keynote speaker…
  • Welcome to EcoWatch
    10-26-2011
    Welcome to the EcoWatch in partnership with Waterkeeper Alliance website. After one year of planning, it feels great to finally go live and expand our coverage nationwide…

720 Literary Rd., Cleveland, OH 44113
spear@ecowatch.org
216-387-1609