While Ohio’s legislature has tried to further weaken the state’s renewable energy standards, lawmakers from two other states – Maryland and Michigan – have beefed up their state’s standards. Maryland is the latest state to do so. Its general assembly passed a law last year that required 22 percent of the electricity sold in the state to be produced by renewable sources by 2020. The old standard had been 20 percent by 2022. In December, Michigan, voted to increase its renewable energy standard to 15 percent from 10 percent by 2021. The legislation also set a voluntary goal of satisfying 35 percent of the state’s electricity demand through a combination of renewable sources, energy efficiency and demand reduction.
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On the second to last day of school, 60 seniors from Kenowa Hills High School in Walker, Michigan, rode their bikes to school. It wasn’t an improvised things either, as they had police escort and did it safely, and even the mayor joined them (handing out donuts, which isn’t exactly health food, but nobody was forced to eat them). But their principal, out of some sort of “I’ll show you who’s boss” primal instinct, decided to reprimand them, calling the bike ride a “prank”, going as far as suspending them from a traditional year’s end celebration at that school.
But calling this a prank is taking the “letter of the law” too far and forgetting the spirit. This wasn’t burning dog poop, exploding toilet and naked kids running around. It was a safe bike ride with adult supervision, something that an untold number of kids do every single school day in many places around the world.
Schools Would be Empty in Amsterdam and Copenhagen…
Now it’s possible that this wasn’t done in the best possible way and that this slowed down traffic some (the school pretends it was terrible, the police escort says it wasn’t a problem — whatever), but it still was an act that should be commended, not punished. This could have been the beginning of a great tradition, and the next ride would have been even better organized, rather than a sour end to some kids’ high-school career.
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