Clearwater’s Next Generation Legacy Project
Clearwater’s Next Generation Legacy Project is dedicated to creating new leaders for tomorrow’s green world. Having played a major role in cleaning up the Hudson and our ongoing effort to preserve and protect the river, Clearwater truly understands that to enact important changes, you have to first inspire and educate and activate people to do so.

Clearwater provides youth with program opportunities throughout their educational years, working to create a new generation of environmental leaders that have the knowledge, motivation and critical thinking skills to take on the serious challenges of the future.

The Next Generation Legacy Project continues to build capacity and reach of its programs in an effort to build a veritable “pipeline” of green thinkers and future environmental leaders of all ethnicities, economic and cultural backgrounds.

Utilizing the greatest natural resource in the region—the Hudson River—Clearwater has been the grassroots model for effecting changes to protect our planet. More than ever before, we need to realize a green, sustainable future by investing in our youth and creating the next generation of environmental leaders. This is what Clearwater is now proudly committing its resources to as a part of Pete Seeger’s remarkable legacy to the human race.  … Read more

River Cities Initiative
Clearwater seeks to connect kids from river communities to the Hudson and get them excited about the environment.  Clearwater is building the funding that is needed to support a host of river-based learning activities.  The Kingston Home Port and Education Center, a partnership between Clearwater and the Hudson River Maritime Museum, serves as a resource for our River Cities Initiative.  Apart from being the sloop Clearwater’s winter home, the Center provides a space for education along the Rondout Creek, including Clearwater’s “winter bos’un” apprentice program, ecology studies, climate change and green infrastructure.

Green Cities Initiative
Clearwater continues the legacy of our founder, Pete Seeger, by bringing environmental education and watershed awareness and stewardship training to under-resourced communities and using community power to create green power. The Initiative serves as a unifying theme for Clearwater’s environmental education, environmental action and justice programs, and as a guiding principle for expanding our critical work to help promote a more sustainable future for our communities now, and for our future generations. Green Cities also assists Hudson River cities in incorporating principles of sustainability into all phases of municipal and community planning. The results create a healthier, greener, and more supportable and equitable Hudson Valley – one that does not simply consider environmental stewardship, but makes it a priority. …Read more

Watershed Management
As a part of Clearwater’s Green Cities Initiative, the organization has successfully engaged community stakeholders, municipalities, and the general public to become invested in the future of their watershed and land-use principles, allowing community and environmental health to be considered a way of life for all.  More than 30 years after the passage of the Clean Water Act, more than half of the streams feeding into the Hudson River watershed have degraded water-quality from pollution and urban/suburban runoff. Clearwater works closely with civic leaders, citizenry, and state and federal regulatory agencies to help protect and manage the Hudson River Watershed by addressing both the point and nonpoint sources of pollution.  …Read more

Indian Point Campaign
Clearwater opposes the proposed 20-year relicensing of Indian Point’s aging nuclear power reactors, IP-2 and IP-3, which are located on the Hudson River in Buchanan, NY, at the intersection of two earthquake faults  and just 25 miles north of New York City, in the most densely populated region of the country. Indian Point’s once-through cooling system uses 2.5 billion gallons of river water and returns it 15 degrees warmer, causing massive fish kills to already declining Hudson River fish populations.

Clearwater is focused on these health and safety issues that potentially affect the Hudson River Valley and New York City in an effort to keep residents safe and assure that the Hudson River ecosystem is protected. With our partners, Clearwater continues to fight Entergy’s ongoing misinformation campaign and to pursue legal challenges in front of the Atomic Safety Relicensing Board, including contentions regarding Environmental Justice, the leaks and on-site waste storage.  A new permit for Indian Point would mean another 20 years of radioactive leaks, seriously overcrowded fuel pools, excessive fish kills and potential disasters. …Read more

Hudson River Polychlorinated Biphenyls Remediation (PCBs)
From 1947 to 1977 two New York General Electric capacitor plants located at Fort Edwards and Hudson Falls discharged over one million pounds of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a group of synthetic, oil-like chemicals of a chlorinated hydrocarbon family, into the Hudson River.

When Clearwater urged the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to require General Electric (GE) to clean up the contamination of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) from the Upper Hudson River, we promised those who supported the remediation that Clearwater would stay actively involved, monitor progress, and do everything in our power to assure the best possible outcome for the river and the people living in its watershed.

In keeping with this commitment, we have actively participated in the Community Advisory Group (CAG) on an ongoing basis. Clearwater is utilizing a $50,000 EPA Technical Assistance Grant (TAG) to help bring good science to answer questions from community members, municipal leaders, and the media and to address important issues and concerns. …Read more

Environmental Justice
Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations and policies. Fair treatment means that no group of people, including racial, ethnic, or socio-economic groups should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal programs and policies. …Read more

Climate Justice
Clearwater in collaboration with community partners has implemented a Climate Justice Initiative in four Hudson Valley cities, Kingston, Poughkeepsie, Beacon, and Peekskill, each of which have waterfronts vulnerable to sea-level rise along their shorelines, to assess potential environmental, economic, public health, and safety impacts of climate change on communities of color and low income.   …Read more