Climate Justice: Joint Comments on Massachusetts’ 2030 Clean Energy and Climate Plan

We write on behalf of 26 organizations to thank the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs for its hard work on the Roadmap Report and 2030 Interim Clean Energy and Climate Plan (“interim CECP”) and to offer the following recommendations to better integrate climate justice into the final plan (“2030 CECP”). EEA has the opportunity and responsibility to integrate more precise language into the 2030 CECP that provides details about actions that will advance climate justice. Climate justicefocuses on the root causes of climate change —human-made greenhouse gas emissions (“GHG”) and related pollution —and making systemic changes that are required to address unequal burdens to our communities and realign our energy systems and economy with our natural systems. Unless justice, equity, and worker rights are central components of our equitable climate agenda in the 2030 CECP, the inequality of the carbon-based economy will be replicated in the new pollution-free economy. Below are specific recommendations, organized by chapters of the 2030 C