Hartford, CT - Today, Connecticut’s Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA) approved a landmark electric vehicle charging program, with an emphasis on making charging more accessible to underserved communities, including at workplaces and apartment buildings.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Late yesterday, Senate Budget Committee Democrats announced an agreement on a $3.5 trillion topline budget number for a reconciliation-based infrastructure package. This is the first step in the process toward crafting a reconciliation package with bold investments in climate action, clean energy, and President Biden’s American Families Plan.
BRUSSELS -- Today, the European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union, presented its plan for a carbon border adjustment mechanism. This carbon dumping fee on imported goods made with a high degree of climate pollution is part of the EU’s commitment to cut emissions 55 percent by 2030 and become climate neutral by 2050.
The Sierra Club supports a carbon dumping fee that:
New Orleans, LA -- The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) must reject Louisiana’s Regional Haze plan if it is not fundamentally changed to comply with the Clean Air Act. The plan is insufficient in many ways, including a failure to review environmental justice impacts for communities disproportionately impacted by air pollution. That is the message Sierra Club and National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) sent to the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (LDEQ) and EPA on Monday as the public comment period for the draft plan expired.
PHILADELPHIA, PA -- Today, President Biden delivered a speech on protecting the freedom to vote just one day after a majority of Texas House Democrats left the state to block a vote on new voter suppression bills. To date, 48 states have introduced nearly 400 bills restricting access to the polls, and the For The People Act, which is awaiting a vote in the U.S. Senate, would halt many of these voter suppression bills.
ATLANTA, GA -- Southern Company is greenwashing its climate commitment, and a new ad campaign by Sierra Club seeks to hold the utility accountable for its promises and alert ratepayers to the utility’s role in preventing a transition to clean energy.
Washington, D.C. — Utilities are trying to greenwash their climate commitments — and a new ad campaign by Sierra Club holds these polluters accountable.
Backers of the fracked gas Mountain Valley Pipeline announced a new scheme today to purchase carbon offsets to make up for the operational emissions of its first 10 years in service. These offsets would do nothing to address the climate impact of extracting or burning the fracked gas that MVP would transport.
RICHMOND -- Today, the Richmond Times reported that Michigan-based NOVI Energy is no longer pursuing the planned development of the C4GT gas power plant in Charles City County.
The Dane County Circuit Court held a hearing today to hear testimony on former Public Service Commissioner Mike Huebsch’s potential conflict of interest when he voted to approve the proposed $700 million Nemadji Trail Energy Center (NTEC) gas plant in Superior, Wisconsin. These issues came to light when it was revealed that, shortly after Huebsch voted to approve the controversial gas plant in January, 2020, he applied for the open position of CEO at Dairyland Power Cooperative, one of two utilities who filed the application. In the hearing, Sierra Club elicited testimony demonstrating that Commissioner Huebsch, in voting to approve a major project for a utility he sought employment from soon thereafter, and one of whose high level executives he had a close personal relationship, was exposed to undue pressure to approve the project, which would have impacted any reasonable person in his position.