Climate 411

New tool equips community voices to spur a just energy transition

Community Voices in Energy logo(This post originally appeared on EDF’s Energy Exchange)

Our new website, Community Voices in Energy — a collaboration with Chicago-based Blacks in Green — equips frontline communities to participate as experts in climate and energy proceedings and influence energy investments. By ensuring that community members are able to share their direct experience on the record in public utility commission hearings, the site helps utility regulators to make rulings that lead to a more equitable, healthy and affordable energy future.

Health and economy at stake

Communities located near polluting power plants experience more health problems, including high rates of asthma and lung disease. They also have less wealth, in part because of lower property values and unaffordable energy rates. Yet frontline, BIPOC and low-income communities have historically been excluded from energy regulatory and legal decision-making spaces that directly impact their quality of life.

Energy is among the largest sources of man-made climate pollution in the world, and energy solutions that benefit communities will also be healthier for the climate. A just transition requires equitable distribution of the benefits of clean energy to communities that have been left behind in the past.

A solution emerges in Illinois

In Illinois, regulators this year alone are considering $1.8 billion in rate hike requests from utilities, much of which will repair and extend systems that would lock in fossil-powered energy for generations to come. But cleaner, more affordable, solutions are available.

Environmental Defense Fund, Blacks in Green, and Citizens Utility Board pioneered the idea of bringing community experts into energy proceedings to provide testimony that could be entered into the legal record on which all commission decisions must be based. In a 2022 decision, the Illinois Commerce Commission explicitly acknowledged that EDF and partners raised its awareness that environmental justice communities experienced longer and more frequent power outages than wealthier Chicago communities, while also having fewer resources to recover from disruptions. As a result, the Commission required the utility to address system disparities, rather than only measuring their system as a whole.

Family staring at wind turbines with a sunset

Community Voices in Energy website drives energy justice

Our Illinois win encouraged us to expand our work and develop the Community Voices in Energy website, so that our community-centered approach can be replicated and spread around the country. Community expert contributors helped to shape the trainings offered on the website to enable meaningful participation in cases, and we developed the Energy Justice Intervenor certification program to support them.

With tools to frame what a just energy system is and how to get involved, the Community Voices in Energy website equips community members to advocate for a more just and equitable system. Including lived experiences at the forefront of big energy decisions will speed the transition to an equitable, affordable, clean, and healthy energy future for everyone.

Since our launch, we have already heard from federal energy regulators and from other states where energy proceedings threaten to lock in high rates and fossil energy at a moment where we must urgently transition to a clean energy. The new Community Voices in Energy website, and the movement it supports, give hope for our energy future.

Also posted in Economics, Energy, Health, News, Partners for Change / Comments are closed

New analysis shows that, in a decisive decade for climate action, Oregon must aim higher

Last legislative session, Oregon’s lawmakers had the opportunity to update Oregon’s statutory climate targets. This would have been the first time that Oregon updated its outdated climate targets in 15 years and would have brought Oregon’s climate goals in line with the level of ambition of President Biden’s national climate targets and from other climate leadership states.

But then, Oregon’s legislative session was stalled by a small group of state Senators who fled the Capitol instead of fulfilling their core responsibility as elected officials: to represent their constituents by casting votes in the legislative process. This walkout tactic has been used time and time again and has prevented climate action supported by a majority of Oregonians. This year’s walkouts — the longest in Oregon’s history — prevented Oregon from updating its climate goals.

Without updated climate goals in place, Oregon risks falling short of securing the greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions that are needed to avoid the most dangerous, irreversible impacts of climate change. Oregon has made important progress in regulating emissions, as one of the states leading the way on cutting pollution from the power sector, the transportation sector, and natural gas fuels — but new analysis by EDF has found that without additional action, Oregon is projected to fall short of achieving its climate commitments.

Here’s what to know about the analysis and next steps Oregon can take to raise the bar for climate action.

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Also posted in Carbon Markets, Energy, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, Policy / Read 1 Response

New Mexico is off course for reaching its climate goals, but there’s enormous opportunity for action

New Mexico communities know the stakes for climate change are high — hotter and drier conditions threaten public health, livelihoods, and cultural and recreational resources, as they lead to increased drought, extended and more extreme wildfire seasons, and extreme heat. Those impacts are projected to get much worse in the coming decades, without serious and urgent action to slash climate pollution. It’s why polls underscore that the majority of New Mexico voters support strong action on climate change.

Governor Lujan Grisham has made bold, science-based climate commitments and both the legislature and regulators have adopted a number of important policies, but a new EDF analysis finds that with existing state and federal policies in place, New Mexico is projected to fall well short of achieving its 2025 and 2030 climate goals unless it takes aggressive climate policy action as soon as possible. The analysis also finds that the state’s current course will lead to far more cumulative emissions through the end of the decade — a critical metric that ultimately determines the severity of climate damages that our kids and grandkids may face.

While New Mexico is projected to face a glaring “emissions gap” — the distance between emission reductions the state has committed to and those it is projected to achieve — the opportunity to correct course with bold action has never been greater. With historic federal investments lowering the cost of clean energy, New Mexico can leverage this momentum to put in place strong limits on pollution that secure a safer climate future and grow a prosperous, equitable clean energy economy.

Here’s what you need to know about this analysis:

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Also posted in Carbon Markets, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, News, Policy / Comments are closed

Washington state’s carbon market continues to raise major investments, as state leaders consider linking to California-Quebec market

Results were released today for Washington’s third quarterly cap-and-invest auction, which was held on August 30th. The results from this sold-out auction continue to demonstrate strong demand for allowances in this program, which has brought in significant revenue for the state of Washington to reinvest in its communities. These results follow on two previous sold-out quarterly auctions, as well as an auction from the Allowance Price Containment Reserve last month which raised an additional $62,491,660 while functioning as a market stabilizing feature. In total, these auctions have generated $919,564,777 for Washington communities.

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Also posted in California, Carbon Markets, Economics, Energy, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, Policy / Read 1 Response

Washington state’s cap-and-invest program demonstrates cost containment features with special August auction

Yesterday, the Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) released the results from Washington’s first Allowance Price Containment Reserve (APCR) auction, held on August 9th. At this auction, all 1,054,000 of the available APCR allowances were sold at the two APCR tier prices of $51.90 and $66.68, with 527,000 allowances available at each price tier. This auction, along with two previous sold-out cap-and-invest auctions, shows continued strong demand for allowances under Washington’s cap-and-invest program and demonstrates the important role that an APCR can play in building predictability and stability into allowances prices.

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Also posted in California, Carbon Markets, Economics, Energy, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Health, News, Policy / Comments are closed

IRA across the USA: 5 communities winning clean energy manufacturing jobs

Two clean manufacturing workers training on site.

A year since the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) was signed into law, this historic climate legislation has already led to $278 billion in private investment that will support more than 170,000 clean energy jobs across the country.

And the work is just getting started.

Manufacturing incentives in the law, which encourage companies to build the clean energy supply chain here in the U.S., are creating manufacturing jobs and new economic opportunities for communities. According to the BlueGreen Alliance, the IRA will spur an estimated 900,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs over the next decade. The law also pairs incentives with labor standards that protect and prepare workers by requiring fair wages and apprenticeships.

Get to know some of the towns and communities around the country that are winning these major manufacturing investments and getting ready to build the clean energy technologies that will power our future.

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Also posted in Economics, Energy, Green Jobs, Innovation, Jobs, News, Policy / Comments are closed