Whittling Away: Weather

By Melanie Lekocevic

Capital Region Independent Media

COEYMANS HOLLOW — A crowd gathered at the memorial opposite the Coeymans Hollow firehouse Monday for the annual Memorial Day ceremony honoring the fallen.

The annual ceremony rotates between several area firehouses, and this year the service was hosted by the Coeymans Hollow Volunteer Fire Corporation.

“We would like to welcome everybody to Coeymans Hollow as we give remembrance to those who have sacrificed their lives for our safety, for our freedom,” Coeymans Hollow Volunteer Fire Corporation President Jerry DeLuca said to welcome the crowd.

Commander Scott Kyle of VFW Post 9594 gave a brief history of Memorial Day — originally called Decoration Day — which honors those who died in service.

“In 1868, Decoration Day came out and it was a remembrance of the soldiers who fell in battle, particularly during the Civil War and the War of the Revolution,” Kyle said. “With that, it was done in May because the flowers started blooming and families could gather and celebrate the lives of those individuals.”

Decoration Day was created three years after the end of the Civil War, on May 5, 1868, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. The birthplace of the holiday remains uncertain, with 25 cities claiming to be the first to celebrate it, but in 1966, President Lyndon Johnson and Congress declared Waterloo, NY, to be the “birthplace” of Memorial Day, according to the department.

The day is not a time to remember war, but to recall those who were lost, Kyle said.

“Memorial Day is not about battle — it’s about the people that lost their lives during those conflicts,” Kyle said.

VFW Post 9594 Past Commander Trip Powell said after the ceremony that Memorial Day is a poignant day that can be difficult for veterans.

“You can see the emotion here — this day means a great deal to veterans because we all know somebody who was killed in service,” Powell said. “It’s a very difficult day for many of us because it takes us back to a painful time, and for everybody else, it’s great to have the support of our community to help us. We appreciate that.”

If care is not taken to remember those who were lost, they die twice, Kyle said.

VFW Post 9594 Chaplain Dan LaMora served in the U.S. Army in the infantry in Vietnam and echoed that sentiment.

“It’s important to remember that when a person dies, they die twice — they died when they went to heaven, and the second time they die is when people forget, when they forget the sacrifice that the men and women have made throughout the ages,” LaMora said. “And that’s not just recently — this goes back to prior to the Civil War and the Revolutionary War, when there were men and women serving in combat units.”

Those who died in combat are not the only ones that need to be remembered, he said.

“When we have a Memorial Day, we are remembering deceased veterans, but we also have veterans, too, that did not see combat, that are deployed throughout the United States, and those that have died in accidents — their memory is still kept alive. This is about all veterans,” LaMora said. “Even though the primary thought is about combat veterans, we have to remember all the veterans and also their parents, the Gold Star Mothers, the Blue Star Mothers. We are here to remember all those men and women who have paid the ultimate sacrifice, either in war or in peacetime. As long as they are being remembered, they will not be forgotten.”

Gold Star Mothers are those who lost a child in the armed forces, and Blue Star Mothers are those with children in active service.

Kyle urged everyone to remember those who died serving their country.

“Those guys raised their right hand, they felt a calling or a need to serve, and they paid the ultimate sacrifice. They lost their lives on the battlefield doing what their country asked them to do,” Kyle said. “That’s why it is important to celebrate it. I don’t think it’s a time of mourning, I think it’s a celebration — a time to celebrate their lives and to honor the fact that they gave their lives for something greater than themselves.”

By Melanie Lekocevic

Capital Region Independent Media

SELKIRK — SABIC is a global company headquartered in Saudi Arabia, but it has plants all over the world, including locally in Selkirk.

The SABIC plant has been located on Noryl Avenue in Selkirk for decades, but some area residents may be unaware of what the company does, so the plant recently invited local media to its facility to present its mission, with a special focus on its environmental initiatives.

SABIC has 31,000 employees across the globe and operates in 50 countries. The company has 66 plants worldwide, including 17 in North America — and among them, the 700-acre facility in Selkirk.

Locally, SABIC employs about 530 workers, according to the company.

SABIC manufactures plastics that are then used by other companies to make their products. A part of the company’s mission is being environmentally conscious, Senior Manager Elizabeth Miakisz said.

“We make products, we make money, but we also have a responsibility to the environment and to the globe,” Miakisz said.

Among the products that use plastics manufactured by SABIC are Fit Bit, Xbox, car parts, Legos and more.

SABIC works with numerous companies across several industries, including clean energy, electrical and electronics, construction, medical devices, packaging and transportation. The original plant was established on 400 acres in 1966, and SABIC acquired the site in 2007. Most of the Selkirk employees work in manufacturing, but there are also some working in technology, research and development, the trades, construction and engineering management, Miakisz said.

Brad Sparks, senior manager of sustainability strategy for the Americas region, outlined the initiatives SABIC has launched in an effort to protect the environment.

“Back in late 2021, we made a global commitment to reduce our carbon emissions,” Sparks said. “That commitment was in two phases. The first phase of the commitment was a 20% reduction in global emissions by 2030. The second part of that commitment was carbon neutrality from our sites and our utilities by 2050.”

The company is employing several types of initiatives to reach those goals, including improving reliability and efficiency in the plant’s operations.

“An operation that is more efficient and more reliable uses less energy and overall will emit less,” Sparks said. “So we are going to continue to focus on that area and become innovative in our approaches.”

SABIC is also looking at expanding its use of renewable energy at its sites worldwide, including solar, wind and hydropower energy, as well as electrifying equipment as an alternative to burning fossil fuels.

One of the company’s plants in Spain is set to be 100% powered by renewable energy by next year, Sparks said.

“It will be the first plant globally that will be powered by renewable energy,” he added.

Using renewable materials in manufacturing is another facet of the company’s environmental focus, such as processing plastic waste, melting it down and reusing it to make new products.

“That is taking waste plastic feedstock that would typically end up in a landfill,” Sparks said. “Rather than putting it in a landfill, you can convert it to make new products. That is attacking the plastic waste challenge. We also make bio-based products, or products that use renewable materials like cooking oil or tall oil from the paper industry — we take those and use them as feedstock in place of fossil fuel feedstocks to make products. The purpose of that is a reduction in the carbon footprint.”

One product that is already on the market is a computer mouse made with recycled plastic that was removed from the ocean.

“We partnered with Microsoft to make a mouse that is made with 20% recycled ocean plastic,” Sparks said. “We were able to collect ocean plastic in Asia and it was fed back into our processes through a mechanically recycled method so we could remake the polymer that goes into producing that mouse. It has done a lot to bring visibility to what can be done with recycled materials.”

Locally, Sparks said the company is taking steps to reduce emissions from the Selkirk plant.

“We are focusing on two areas — carbon neutrality and circular products,” he said. “Our approach to sustainability here in Selkirk has a lot to do with partnering. We have partnered with New York state and some of its entities for quite some time in order to help bring about some of our projects that are sustainability related.”

The company has secured incentives through National Grid, NYSERDA and the New York Power Authority, aimed largely at improving efficiency at the plant and electrifying equipment.