Over 6,000 Arizonans Appeal to ACC for a Transition Away from Fossil Fuels to Renewable Energy

Phoenix, AZ-- Today marked the end of a two and a half year public input process by the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) to reevaluate and, potentially, modernize the state’s energy system. In August 2018, the ACC opened up a docket (RU-00000A-18-0284) colloquially known as the Arizona Clean Energy Rules, which could impact everything from updating energy use and efficiency standards to utilities’ resource planning rules. In November 2020, the ACC voted to advance the energy rules to formal rulemaking. 

The rules include:

• A Clean Energy Standard that will require utilities to meet a 100 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050 and meet benchmarks along the way. 
• New battery storage targets, including a percentage that is customer owned or leased 
• New transparent and accountable long-range resource planning processes for utilities, ensuring there will be increased stakeholder oversight and a competitive bidding process for new energy sources, plus preferential siting of renewable resources in coal-impacted communities.
• An extension and strengthening of the state’s energy efficiency resource standard which will ensure that customers of Arizona Public Service and Tucson Electric Power have more tools to lower their bills and cut energy waste.

This week, the Commission, including newly-elected commissioners, heard a new round of public comments before their final vote later this year to officially adopt, modify, or reject the above rules. 

More than 6,000 Arizonans, groups, cities, counties, and businesses have provided written and oral comments in support of modernizing Arizona’s energy system, and powering it with clean, sustainable energy. Earlier this month, 22 stakeholders, including Sierra Club, American Lung Association in Arizona, and Pima County also submitted a letter in support of a clean and fair energy future for Arizona. 

“Over the last two and half years, Arizonans voiced their support for transitioning to a modern, clean, and sustainable energy system that will save customers money, create jobs, and address the climate crisis. We want to protect our air, water, health and each other as the climate crisis intensifies,” said Sandy Bahr, Director of the Sierra Club’s Grand Canyon Chapter. “We need commissioners to lead on clean energy, affirmed by science, economics, and popular support, to help protect communities that have been unfairly burdened by fossil fuel pollution and high utility costs.” 

On Thursday, Stategen released a report that finds that adopting the Clean Energy Rules would not only significantly reduce carbon emissions to address the climate crisis, but also create an economic windfall of $2 billion for Arizona. 

Even before the COVID-19 crisis, one-third of all Americans struggled to pay their energy bills with Black, Indigenous, and People of Color bearing a disproportionate energy burden. This issue has only been exacerbated by COVID-19. Communities of color and Indigenous nations, like the Navajo and Hopi, have put up with decades of pollution and contamination to power cities across the West, and the utilities, which profited as a result, have a responsibility to support a just and equitable transition to clean energy to help protect Arizona’s most vulnerable communities from unfair environmental and economic challenges. 

See below for statements from various Arizonans who are advocating to protect their communities from the fossil fuel heavy energy system that currently exists in Arizona.

"More than 115 Arizona faith leaders—Bishops and Rabbis, Pastors, Priests, and Imams---affirmed their support for the clean energy rules. We recognize what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called ‘the first urgency of now.’ Climate change is an existential threat,” said Reverend Doug Bland, Executive Director at Arizona Interfaith Power & Light. “Clean energy is not just a political issue, an economic issue, a scientific issue, a health issue; clean energy is a moral issue. We are all called to care for God’s creation.”    

“As an organization that works with communities most impacted by climate change we strongly call upon the Commissioners to adopt the Energy Rules. The Energy Rules are a strong step forward to address energy burdened communities and communities most impacted by poor air quality and the climate crisis,” stated Vianey Olivarria, Communications Director with Chispa Arizona. “Commissioners must think of Arizona families and set energy policies that prioritize our environment, our health and take action to fight climate change. A failure to adopt the Energy Rules is an affront to the safety and health of our communities and is an Arizona-last position.”