DC's Utility Regulators Must Take Proactive Climate Leadership

Testimony of Mark Rodeffer
Sierra Club DC Chapter
at the
DC Council Committee on Business and Economic Development Public Roundtable
on the
Public Service Commission Nomination
Thursday December 3, 2020

Councilmember McDuffie, thank you for holding this public roundtable on the nomination to fill the current vacancy on the Public Service Commission. My name is Mark Rodeffer and I am testifying today on behalf of the Sierra Club.

The Sierra Club is the nation’s oldest, largest, and most influential environmental advocacy group. We are a grassroots organization with chapters in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Here in DC we have 3,000 dues-paying members. Our top priority is combating climate change, which will require an economy-wide transition from fossil fuels to clean energy like wind and solar, and also energy efficiency. This transition is relevant to the Committee on Business and Economic Development because clean energy and energy efficiency create jobs in DC and the region, whereas fossil fuels siphon money away from our local economy, sending our dollars to the faraway places where dirty fuels are drilled, mined and fracked. In short, clean energy and energy efficiency mean more business and more economic development in DC.

The Sierra Club appreciates, Councilmember McDuffie, that you scheduled a second public roundtable on this nomination after the previous roundtable was scheduled with very short notice. Though we are pleased you are allowing stakeholders and members of the public to provide testimony today, we regret that the nominee is not appearing today to answer questions committee members may have after hearing from today’s witnesses.

On May 11 of this year, the Sierra Club sent a letter to Mayor Bowser calling for bold leadership on the Public Service Commission. [1] We asked the Mayor to nominate a commissioner who will carry out the Mayor’s robust climate commitments, which include a 50 percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from 2006 levels by 2032 and carbon neutrality by 2050. The Mayor’s Clean Energy DC plan states: “Achieving its 2050 GHG carbon neutral target will require the District to eliminate fossil fuel use.”^[2]

In addition to the 2032 and 2050 commitments, the District has made other significant climate commitments. DC has joined the C40 Cities Net Zero Carbon Building Commitment, which commits that new buildings in DC will operate at net-zero carbon by 2030 and that all buildings will operate at net-zero carbon by 2050.^[3] This climate commitment is particularly important in the District of Columbia, because 73 percent of our greenhouse emissions come from buildings.^[4] The Department of Energy and Environment has determined that to meet DC’s 2050 climate commitment, by 2040, 70 percent of DC’s existing homes must be fully electrified, with no fossil fuel combustion in the homes.^[5]

The Public Service Commission, as the regulator of the District’s electric and gas utilities, will make vital decisions regarding whether DC will implement our climate commitments or whether those commitments are just words on a piece of paper. We believe the Commission needs bold and visionary leadership so that it can lead the planning process to ensure fossil fuel use is eliminated by 2050. Though the Commission has made some progress, we believe it needs to change its focus from reacting to utility proposals to proactive climate leadership. The DC Council assigned that leadership role to the Commission in the Clean Energy DC Omnibus Act of 2018, which requires the Commission to uphold DC’s climate commitments in its regulation of the utilities.^[6]

DC’s climate commitments are appropriately robust, given our unique vulnerability to climate change. DC is a low-lying city that sits along two tidal rivers, making sea level rise from climate change a serious threat, especially in Wards 2, 5, 6, 7 and 8, all of which border the Potomac River or the Anacostia River. Extreme heat waves, which are increasingly common because of climate change, are a life-and-death threat to DC’s residents, especially seniors, low-income residents and those without air conditioning.^[7]

Meeting DC’s climate commitments will be no easy task. But it is a task the whole of DC government must meet if we are to spare our residents from the most devastating impacts of climate change. In 2050, we do not want to tell our children and our grandchildren that the job was just too hard, that we decided to give up, and that they, not us, will live with the long-term consequences of our failure.

Mitigating climate change and protecting our residents – especially the most vulnerable among us – will happen only with a bold and proactive Public Service Commission. Protecting DC from the worst effects of climate change will require significant vision and expertise from the commissioners. The Sierra Club asks that the DC Council confirm Public Service Commission nominees with a strong commitment to climate mitigation and expertise in energy issues so that DC can meet our climate commitments and protect our residents.