The most comprehensive online source of conservation news and events in Maine and beyond, edited by Jym St. Pierre
Thank you for reading Maine Environmental News. Each year, we post thousands of news summaries, notices, and links related to important environmental issues from across the state (and beyond). If you find this service useful, you can help us continue to provide it by making a donation. Just click on the button below and contribute whatever you can afford. Thanks again for your generous support!
Sincerely,
Jym St. Pierre
Editor, Maine Environmental News
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • April 1, 2026
Maine’s annual moose hunting permits (tags) are a highly sought-after commodity. So how they are distributed gets a lot of attention. The concept of setting aside tags for lodges and outfitters dates back about a decade, when northern Maine’s deer population declined and many outfitters struggled financially. The goal was to help them regain economic footing. Some outfitters, however, began selling the tags to clients for prices exceeding $30,000. The lodge tag process expanded beyond its original intent. Restaurants, hotels and even a nudist colony in southern Maine reportedly applied for and received a lodge tag. LD 2054 would tighten the definition of hunting outfitters and prohibit the sale of lodge tags to anyone other than the hunter. As for the nudist colony that drew a lodge tag, eligible members would still have to don an orange vest and cap. ~ V. Paul Reynolds
MAINE AUDUBON • March 1, 2026
The third edition of Maine Amphibians and Reptiles explores the lives of 38 fascinating species—from tiny newts to rarely seen sea turtles—found across Maine and the Northeast. Built on 25 years of research, with expanded photos, regional studies, and engaging writing, it’s perfect for scientists and curious readers alike. Join some of the contributors to this fascinating book for a talk followed by a book sale and signing at the Falmouth Memorial Library. Light refreshments will be provided. At Falmouth Memorial Library, 5 Lunt Rd, Falmouth, ME, March 11, 5:30pm.
SUN JOURNAL • April 1, 2026
DEAR SUN SPOTS: With Earth Day happening on Wednesday, April 22, I’d like to hear about what Sun Spotters are doing that day (or on the surrounding weekends) for our beautiful, yet struggling, planet. ANSWER: Thanks for letting us know about this, Cindy. I like the idea of planting and donating and will certainly mention it to the crew of neighbors I gather with for Earth Day which this year has the theme, “Our Power, Our Planet.” Some other ideas that come to mind is to contact your local school, college campus, or church to see what they’ll be up to on Earth Day — perhaps you can join in. I once was part of a group where over 30 women got together in the morning to collect and dispose of roadside trash. The Nature Conservancy website (https://www.nature.org/en-us/get-involved/how-to-help/earth-day/) has some unique ideas that include going on a scavenger hunt, bird watching, clearing trails, creating a special pollinator garden, and more.
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • April 1, 2026
The state’s transportation department is planning a $2.5 million project to extend a popular paved pedestrian and bicycle trail in Ellsworth to the 96-mile Down East Sunrise Trail. Ellsworth’s 1.3 mile multi-use trail, running parallel to State Street between Lakes Lane and Birch Avenue, is set to be connected to the lengthy Down East Sunrise Trail, which extends from the city’s High Street corridor to Perry, on the eastern edge of Washington County. Construction of the connector trail in Ellsworth is slated to begin in the summer of 2028.
MAINE AUDUBON • April 1, 2026
Curious about what critters live in your local streams and freshwater marshes? Learn about Maine Marsh and Stream Explorers, a collaborative community science project between Maine Audubon and the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). This program trains volunteers to survey for macroinvertebrates, or large aquatic insects, in streams and freshwater marshes statewide. April 22, 7 pm, online, preregister.
MORE THAN JUST PARKS • March 31, 2026
Late Tuesday afternoon, with the subtlety of a wrecking ball, the Trump administration announced the most devastating attack on the U.S. Forest Service in the agency’s 121-year history. They’re ripping the headquarters out of Washington and shipping it to Salt Lake City, Utah — the beating heart of the anti-public-lands movement. They’re shuttering every one of the ten regional offices that have governed this agency since Gifford Pinchot built the system over a century ago — and with them, the career professionals who spent entire lifetimes earning expertise. They’re destroying more than fifty research facilities across thirty-one states, labs that house decades of irreplaceable long-term science, the kind you cannot restart once it’s gone. And they’re replacing all of it — the offices, the scientists, the institutional knowledge, the professional independence — with fifteen political appointees embedded in state capitals alongside the governors, legislators, and industry lobbyists who have spent their careers demanding that the Forest Service log more, protect less, and get out of the way.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • March 31, 2026
Maine lawmakers Tuesday took a possible step toward establishing a program to recoup money from large, corporate polluters to pay for the impacts of climate change. The House passed a bill that would study how much greenhouse gas emissions have cost the state in a 75-72 vote that fell largely along party lines. The Senate passed the bill 19-13 earlier in the week with Democrats in support and Republicans opposed. The bill, LD 1870 started out as a proposal for a so-called “climate superfund” that would collect fees from groups that extract fossil fuels and refine crude oil and whose activities are found to contribute to certain levels of greenhouse gas emissions. The money would be used to fund climate change adaptation projects. It was revised to a proposal for a study of the cost to the state of greenhouse gas emissions from 1995 to 2024.
MAINE MORNING STAR • March 31, 2026
Maine lawmakers have given initial approval to a bill to study the costs of climate change in the state, amending a prior proposal that would have launched a program to get polluters to pay for those damages. The Senate advanced LD 1870 with a first vote of 19-13 Monday followed by an initial vote of 75-72 in the House of Representatives Tuesday. The votes were mostly along party lines.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • March 31, 2026
Some 234,000 acres of Indigenous land in Maine was granted to Colby and Bowdoin colleges between 1796 and 1861. The Massachusetts Legislature, which governed the District of Maine until it became a state in 1820, granted to Bowdoin College a total of 182,000 acres of “unappropriated lands” in central Maine. Colby received just over 52,000 acres. The institutions would parlay that into tens of thousands of dollars used to fund construction of their first buildings. It was a small fraction of the 12 million acres to which Wabanaki Nations laid claim. After Congress passed the Morrill Act in 1862, creating so-called “land grant universities,” the University of Maine received 210,000 acres scattered across the United States. Now, as the tribes work to regain land, some Maine institutions are grappling with how — or whether — to address the legacy of their involvement in its dispossession.
MAINE PUBLIC • March 30, 2026
New England electric customers including Maine ratepayers could get more than $1 billion in refunds after federal energy regulators ruled this month that transmission utilities were paid inflated profits for years. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission draws to a close a case against the utilities that was first filed in 2011, said Maine Public Advocate Heather Sanborn. "We're hopeful that transmission rates will come down as a result of this ruling and also that 15 years of overpayments will eventually be refunded to customers through their rates," Sanborn said.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • March 30, 2026
With 16 miles of coastline, the city of South Portland has a dedicated interest in protecting our waterways from microplastics that are harmful to our ecosystems and ourselves. Single-use plastics are everywhere. However, the University of Maine’s inaugural reusables pilot program offers a feasible alternative. Researchers at UMaine partnered with the volunteer coalition Reuse Maine and three coastal communities — Bar Harbor, Bath, and South Portland — to pilot a reusable food and beverage takeout packaging program. The goal is to explore the potential of reusable takeout packaging to reduce waste, prevent plastic pollution, and save money on the purchase and disposal costs of single-use packaging. You can learn more at umaine.edu/reuseme. Customers at six participating establishments can now check out a reusable container by downloading the Recirclable app and return the containers to any participating establishment.
MAINE PUBLIC • March 30, 2026
It's mid-March, and even if most of the snow has melted in southern and coastal Maine, on Saddleback Mountain it's very much still winter. It's one of six sites set up this winter, and one of the few places in New England capturing snow depth on mountains higher than 2,500 feet. Despite decades of snow monitoring records across the region, very little is known about the snowpack at higher mountain elevations, said Julia Daly, a geology professor at University of Maine Farmington. That's left a critical information gap at a time when a warming climate is affecting winter recreation, cold-adapted ecosystems and flooding risks. Monitoring mountain snow is helpful for water management, flood predictions and the winter recreation industry. It can also help better identify "climate refugia" in Maine's mountains — areas that may be buffered to the worst effects of soaring global temperatures driven by burning fossil fuels.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • March 30, 2026
Site work will begin this week on a Portland housing development that was the subject of a lawsuit from abutters after a judge affirmed the planning board’s decision to green light the project. A Superior Court ruling this month sided with the developer on nearly every claim, and lifted an administrative stay that had delayed construction of the 50-unit Belfort Landing development in the Riverton neighborhood.
EARTH JUSTICE • March 30, 2026
A federal court struck down President Trump’s attacks against the Endangered Species Act (ESA), restoring key values of the bedrock environmental law to the status it held for decades before the first Trump administration attacked the bedrock environmental law. After a seven-year legal saga, the court found that a series of regulations from 2019 and 2024 were in clear violation of the statute, and ordered those regulations immediately vacated. The ruling will derail ongoing efforts by the current Trump administration to further weaken the ESA. The ruling reaffirms that federal agencies must use the best available science when assessing harm to species, they cannot ignore incremental harm to critical habitat, and the agencies must firmly commit to any measures relied upon to reduce harm to imperiled plants and animals. Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, and WildEarth Guardians, represented by Earthjustice, challenged regulations issued seven years ago by the first Trump administration.
NATIONAL PARKS TRAVELER • March 30 2026
A federal judge on Monday partially ruled that the first Trump administration erred when it weakened aspects of the Endangered Species Act. The ruling was heralded by environmental groups, saying it underscored that “federal agencies must use the best available science when assessing harm to species, they cannot ignore incremental harm to critical habitat, and the agencies must firmly commit to any measures relied upon to reduce harm to imperiled plants and animals.” Judge Jon S. Tigar held that a handful of regulatory provisions affecting the ESA implemented during President Donald Trump’s first term “were unlawful because they contradict the text of the ESA or were arbitrary and capricious.”
E&E NEWS • March 30, 2026
A coalition of environmental groups scored a win Monday in a long legal battle when a federal court tossed out a set of regulatory rollbacks that undercut Endangered Species Act protections. The ruling comes after nearly a decade of legal combat that began under the first Trump administration to challenge how the federal government evaluated the risks to vulnerable species before advancing new projects. The decision is also likely to hobble current efforts to further weaken the landmark species law, environmental groups said. The administration is taking other actions that could put endangered species at risk. A court has also cleared the way for the administration to convene its Endangered Species Committee — the so-called “God Squad” — on Tuesday to decide whether to override ESA protections for species.
MAINE PUBLIC • March 30, 2026
As the war with Iran continues to roil global energy markets, Maine's logging and trucking industries are among those feeling the squeeze from rising fuel prices. The price of diesel in Maine has jumped by more than 30% in the last month. Dana Doran, executive director of the trade group Professional Logging Contractors of the Northeast, said loggers are also having to absorb that extra cost as they wrap up the winter harvest. "Contractors are taking it on the chin right now," Doran said. "Hopefully, when we get to May and June, if this continues, I think that the mills are going to have no choice but to try to offset some of this diesel cost and increase the price they're paying for wood."
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • March 30, 2026
Alina Nickerson, 19, of Gorham, was riding a snowmobile on Primary Trail 134 about 5:10 p.m. Saturday with three other snowmobilers. As Nickerson rode through snow dust kicked up by snowmobiles ahead of her, she lost control on a downhill right turn and hit a rock. She was taken to Upper Connecticut Valley Hospital in Colebrook, New Hampshire, where Nickerson was treated for her injuries. Investigators believe unreasonable speed was a contributing factor in the crash.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • March 30, 2026
Maine allocates a small percentage of moose tags for sporting camps, which have long been destinations for hunting and fishing trips in the most rural parts of the state. Hunters pay between $10,000 and $33,000 for packages that include a guaranteed tag, lodging, meals and guiding services. State officials, guides and outfitters say loose guidelines have allowed some sporting camps to access tags through a lucrative secondary market. That has taken opportunities away from other guides and limited availability for nonresidents vying for tags in the state’s prime hunting season. Now, lawmakers are considering reforms that would prohibit the resale of tags and put a cap on the number of sporting lodge tags.
