Mother Nature has been kind to the Rochester area.

The region has great natural features like Lake Ontario and the wetlands along its shore, glacial formations in Mendon Ponds Park, and ample freshwater resources, including the pristine Hemlock and Canadice Lakes, which provide drinking water for some Monroe County residents. The region also includes mature forests, and migratory bird habitat and stopover points.

Area environmentalists say all of this is worth fighting for. They tackle invasive species, work to stop or minimize water pollution, and push for cleaner, more efficient options in transportation and energy generation. As new threats emerge, they respond.

And while the Rochester region has some outstanding natural resources, it's also coping with some weighty environmental issues, some which have been going on for decades. The Genesee River and near-shore Lake Ontario, for example, suffer from pollution and limitations such as fish consumption advisories. Others threats are newer, including the invasion of the emerald ash borer, an insect that burrows into and kills native ash trees.

Earth Day is Friday, April 22: a full day dedicated to educating the public on environmental issues. In that spirit, some of the region's environmental leaders offered up a handful of prevailing issues of concern, ongoing and emerging. They range from highly local projects, such as the restoration of Washington Grove in Cobb's Hill Park, to complicated national issues such as nuclear power.

Many of these issues are connected to climate change. High fossil-fuel consumption increases the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which drives climate change. A warming planet has a host of implications. For example, some plant and animal species can now survive and even thrive in places they couldn't before.

Energy sources and consumption is the subject of an important and intricate national conversation. It affects New York in several ways.

The state has seen controversy over the prospect of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing in the Marcellus Shale. The rock formation lies underneath several states and New York's Southern Tier, and energy companies say it's a major natural gas resource. Companies are already drilling in the West Virginia and Pennsylvania sections of the formation; they've been especially aggressive in Pennsylvania.

Fracking critics say drilling has the potential to contaminate ground and surface water. They also say that, while cleaner than coal, extracting and burning natural gas still contributes to global warming. Hugh Mitchell, a long-time member of the Sierra Club's Rochester chapter, says environmental groups across the state are conducting petition drives and letter-writing campaigns. They want Governor Andrew Cuomo to ask the DEC to redo the initial draft of the environmental impact statement, Mitchell says, because it is insufficient. Environmental groups statewide criticized the document for lacking enforceable regulations and penalties.

The State Department of Environmental Conservation has been developing an environmental statement on the combined use of horizontal drilling and fracking in the Marcellus and Utica Shales. That process has taken more than two years so far, and the agency received approximately 14,000 comments to review, a DEC spokesperson says. A revised draft is due early this summer, he says, and the public will have a chance to offer comments.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency is conducting its own study of hydraulic fracturing, focusing on the public-health implications of fracking as a means of extracting natural gas. Some environmental groups want state environmental officials to wait for the results of that study before deciding whether to allow fracking in the state's Marcellus Shale.

Last year, the New York Power Authority solicited proposals to build offshore wind projects in Lakes Erie and Ontario. NYPA would enter into a long-term power-purchasing agreement with any chosen developer.

The Great Lakes Offshore Wind project, as it's called, hasn't received much attention lately. NYPA hasn't selected any proposals or released details about who submitted proposals, the exact site or sites under consideration, or the size of any proposed wind development. Prior to requesting proposals, the authority identified several areas in Lakes Ontario and Erie with good potential for wind power.

The proposal was controversial from the start and opponents claimed it could mar views of the lake and harm fish and birds. Lakeshore property owners campaigned against the project, as did some fishing charter operators. Local governments along Lakes Ontario and Erie issued official objections to the project. They include the Monroe County Legislature, the Wayne County Board of Supervisors, the Irondequoit Town Board, the Greece Town Board, and the Webster Town Board.

The state and local Audubon Society chapters do not oppose the project, though their support of offshore wind comes with caveats.

June Summers, president of the Genesee Valley Audubon Society, says the state needs to establish offshore wind regulations. Officials should develop siting guidelines, she says, and should require three years of study to determine migration patterns in the area, which will help appropriately locate the towers and turbines. The state should also require ongoing monitoring once an offshore project is built, she says.

"We need the regulations in place to require the companies to do this work," Summers says. "Wind power and solar power look to be some of our best answers at this time as far as reducing the effects of climate change."

Frank Regan, an active Sierra Club member who runs www.rochesterenvironment.com, says that the GLOW project is a good opportunity to boost renewable energy in New York, and aesthetic concerns shouldn't halt the project. Without cutting down on fossil fuel use, he says, climate change will alter the lake's conditions anyway.

"I don't think the general public understands that when the counties say no to this, they're saying ‘Well, then we've got to have nuclear power, we've got to have coal, we've got to have oil, we've got to have these other things,'" Regan says. "That's the default. That's what happens."

Nuclear power, too, will get more scrutiny, due to the near-catastrophe Japan is experiencing with its plants, Mitchell says. Sierra Club members and officials are particularly concerned with on-site storage of spent nuclear fuel.

Energy conservation will also be key heading into the future. The simplest, cheapest way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is to use less energy, whether it's electricity generated from a natural gas power plant or gasoline in automobiles.

There has been progress in this area. Take, for example, the Finger Lakes Energy Smart Communities program, which is part of a broader state energy-efficiency program run locally, through contract, by the Center for Environmental Information.

The program is a sort of clearinghouse for the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority's many residential and business incentive programs. NYSERDA will, for example, pay for an energy audit for households making less than $133,000. After the audits, residents are presented with a ranked list of upgrades that'll help make their homes more energy efficient. That can include sealing the house, installing insulation, or putting in a more efficient furnace. Households receiving audits under this program become eligible for up to $13,000 in subsidized loans to fund the top three upgrades on their lists.

"This is to encourage them about doing these energy-efficient upgrades," says Lee Loomis, one of the local program's two full-time coordinators.

Other programs are aimed at lower-income residents for things like replacing inefficient appliances. Businesses can get subsidies for audits and incentives for installing pre-qualified energy-efficient equipment such as lighting, commercial refrigeration, variable speed drives, and heating and air conditioning. Finger Lakes Energy Smart Communities also recruits contractors to pursue the appropriate certification so they can perform NYSERDA-backed audits and improvements.

Interest in the programs has been growing. In 2008, 5,213 households across the state undertook energy-efficient projects after getting an audit. That increased to 6,123 in 2010. In Monroe County, those figures were 1,033 in 2008 and 1,674 in 2010.

Transportation is another area ripe for curtailing energy consumption.

The Environmental Protection Agency says that in 2008, transportation accounted for 27 percent of domestic greenhouse-gas emissions. It's also the fastest growing source of emissions.

One of the best ways to curb those emissions is for people to walk or bike short distances, says Regan, who chairs the Sierra Club's Transportation Committee. Using mass transit also helps.

Rochester officials have been developing a plan to make city streets more accommodating to cyclists. The Bicycle Master Plan, a guide for city spending on bicycle infrastructure, is in its final stages of development.

If the city follows through and implements the plan's recommendations, Rochester's streets should become friendlier to cyclists. And that will encourage people to use bikes as a transportation alternative, Regan says.

To advance the issue, transportation advocates and agencies are holding the Greater Rochester Active Transportation Symposium on April 27 at Radisson Riverside Rochester Hotel. Active transportation essentially refers to walking, biking, skateboarding, or other human-powered means of getting around.

Ultimately, rising gas prices may be what gets people out of their cars. If gas gets near $5 a gallon, Regan says, that may be a tipping point.

"It would be great if we could just motivate them now to do it," he says.

Waste reduction and recycling has been a staple environmental issue for decades. Onondaga County's waste management agency decided last summer to start accepting No. 5 plastic containers for recycling. That prompted some local residents to push Monroe County government to expand its plastics recycling program.

That hasn't happened yet. County officials have resisted collecting Nos. 3 through 7 plastics because, they say, there's no market for them. But Regan says there has been some movement on the issue, especially since the state's bottle bill has taken more and more plastic out of municipal recycling collections, and because of rising oil prices; petroleum products are used in plastics manufacturing.

Regan also stresses the importance of paper recycling and says the county does well at it. The county has sponsored campaigns to encourage residents to recycle more paper, and Regan backs that effort.

"Way too much paper goes into the waste stream," he says.

Waste reduction is an issue across New York. It's addressed in the state's new solid waste management plan, Beyond Waste, which focuses on increasing recycling and reuse, and also on eliminating waste at its source. One way to do that is to provide incentives for companies to reduce packaging materials, or providing a disincentive for companies that generate a lot of packing materials that ultimately end up as garbage or recycling.

The plan will cost money to implement, however. It's also closer to a set of guidelines than a collection of legal requirements.

"It's a great plan," Regan says. "It has a lot of zero-waste components to it. But it doesn't have any teeth. It doesn't have any enforcement behind it."

Local environmentalists and agencies have waged a long fight against invasive species. Invasives can be fish and other aquatic organisms, insects, plants, and even trees. They've all been introduced from somewhere outside of New York and, once established, are nearly impossible to get rid of.

Environmentalists and agencies have embraced educational efforts to help stop the spread of these species and to prevent new ones from being established. They've printed brochures, held invasive species walks, and, in the case of the State Department of Environmental Conservation, conducted media and advertising campaigns.

They've also used hands-on restoration efforts, such as a Sierra Club project to remove invasive Norway maple trees from Washington Grove.

Water quality in area streams and lakes is another long-term focus. Gone are the days of discharging sewage and high volumes of industrial waste into Lake Ontario. Instead, the focus is on near-shore water quality and its contributors, namely nutrient runoff into the Genesee River and other streams that feed into it or the lake.

The Center for Environmental Information has been studying phosphorous levels in lower Black Creek and upper Oak Orchard Creek, then working to pinpoint the sources. Phosphorous is a nutrient that contributes to algae growth, and both streams carry it toward Lake Ontario.

That project involves the use of computer modeling to aid in determining the sources. That model has shown that, while agricultural and residential fertilizer runoff contribute to the contamination, animal activities are a bigger source. Septic systems are also significant contributors.

The project will accomplish two things. First, CEI researchers are creating and documenting a process that, if successful, can be used by other people. Second, identifying the sources of the contamination allows for corrective action. But there's a catch.

"There's great opportunity there, but all that stuff takes time and effort and sometimes money on people's part to fix it," says George Thomas, executive director of CEI. "I don't know if we'll be able to muster up what it takes to do that."

Upcoming environmental events

Sierra Club forum

The Sierra Club's annual environmental forum is at 6 p.m. on Thursday, April 21, at First Unitarian Church, 220 South Winton Road. The topic this year is Sustainable Production: Rochester's Cutting Edge. The event will feature two speakers: Nabil Nasr, director of RIT's Golisano Institute for Sustainability; and Catherine Reeves, director of sustainable operations at Xerox. The speakers start at 7 p.m., but more than 30 environmental groups and sustainable food and drink vendors will be set up beforehand. Upstate Green Business Network will hold its monthly Green Drinks event at the forum as well.

Transportation symposium

The Greater Rochester Active Transportation Symposium is from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Wednesday, April 27, at the Radisson Rochester Riverside Hotel, 120 East Main Street. The symposium will focus on making Rochester a more active transportation-friendly community. Presenters will discuss success stories from other communities, national and local innovations, policy, planning considerations, and funding information. To register, go to grats.eventbrite.com.

Earth Day in the Park

An Earth Day event will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 16, in Area 4 of Hamlin Beach State Park. The event will feature entertainment, vendors, and booths focusing on recycling, green building, and alternative energy. An electronics recycler will be on hand to take in printer cartridges and unwanted devices. There will be an organized beach cleanup and the event will conclude with a tour of the old Civilian Conservation Corps-Prisoners of Water camp.

Invasive species talks

June Summers, president of the Genesee Valley Audubon Society, will talk about invasive species and how to stop them from spreading at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, May 17, at the Monroe Avenue branch of the Rochester Public Library, 809 Monroe Avenue, and again at 11 a.m. on Saturday, May 21, at the Lyell Avenue branch of the Rochester Public Library, 956 Lyell Avenue. Summer will also present programs at the Seneca Park Zoo. She'll discuss invasive and native plants from 10 to 11 a.m. on Sunday, May 1, and from 10 to 11 a.m. on Sunday, May 15, she'll discuss attracting wildlife to your back yard. Call 585-336-7213 to register.

NYSERDA programs

The New York State Energy Research and Development authority offers a number of home and business energy-efficiency incentive programs. For details, visit www.getenergysmart.org or call 1-877-697-6278.