Testimony of Mark Rodeffer
Sierra Club
DC Council Committee of the Whole
Resilient and Energy Efficient Historic Properties Amendment Act of 2024 (B25-0793)
October 8, 2024
Thank you, Chairman Mendelson, for the opportunity to testify today. My name is Mark Rodeffer. I am testifying today on behalf of the Sierra Club, America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with about 3,000 dues-paying members here in the District of Columbia.
The Sierra Club supports the Resilient and Energy Efficient Historic Properties Amendment Act of 2024 and we urge the Committee of the Whole to approve the legislation.
The District has committed to become carbon neutral by 2045, requiring that we eliminate all fossil fuel combustion over the next 20 years. This means that DC needs to fully transition its buildings off methane gas, which will require the widespread adoption of energy efficient sources of heating and cooling like air-source heat pumps. It also means that DC must transition personal and fleet vehicles from gasoline and diesel to electricity, which requires new electric charging infrastructure. Additionally, DC has committed to generate 15% of its electricity from solar energy in DC by 2041, which will require an expansion of solar panels in DC.
DC is not on track to meet our climate commitments for building electrification, EVs, and solar energy. Unfortunately, the Historic Preservation Review Board (HPRB) is too often an obstacle to DC achieving its climate commitments, putting the aesthetics of the past ahead of the future of the planet.
In 2019, after denying solar panels on homes in historic districts, the HPRB issued new guidelines purported to address the problem. The guidelines allow HPRB to continue to downsize or even outright deny new solar panels, and the Sierra Club opposed the 2019 guidelines. It’s unclear how many renewable energy generation or energy efficiency projects historic preservation officials have denied since the new guidance went into effect nearly five years ago. The Sierra Club requests that HPRB share with the Council and the public at this hearing the number and kinds of renewable energy and energy efficiency projects it has rejected or scaled back since 2019.
While HPRB views solar panels as blemishes that violate the principles of historic preservation, unsightly methane gas meters proliferate in DC’s historic districts, often in front of homes. Washington Gas meters did not exist during the periods of history we purportedly want to protect, yet these eyesores are allowed. HPRB has it backward – preserving our past for future generations requires that we move away from fossil fuels and that we embrace renewable energy and energy efficiency.
The Sierra Club asks that the Council strengthen the Resilient and Energy Efficient Historic Properties Act of 2024 by amending it to remove from HPRB oversight the installation of solar panels, heat pumps, and electric vehicle chargers. Electrification, renewable energy, and energy efficiency are the steps we must take to tackle the climate crisis. We cannot let the aesthetic sensibilities of a few stand in the way of a future for us all.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.