Líderes hispanos abordan impactos comunitarios con el cambio climático

BRIDGEPORT.- Líderes hispanos y defensores del medio ambiente se reunieron esta semana para abordar cuestiones ambientales que históricamente han marginado a esas comunidades.

El evento fue organizado por la Comisión de Mujeres, Niños, Adultos Mayores, Equidad y Oportunidades, junto con el Acadia Center y Save the Sound.

Las disparidades históricas en los impactos del cambio climático han generado importantes problemas de salud dentro de las comunidades hispanas, según Alexander Rodríguez, especialista en justicia ambiental de Save the Sound.

Pero incluso si algunas personas se mudan a lugares como Connecticut, los impactos del cambio climático todavía están presentes, según Jayson Velázquez, asociado de políticas de justicia climática y energética en el Acadia Center.

“A medida que aumentan las inundaciones en las comunidades costeras y nuestras ciudades urbanas continúan inundándose con el agua de las inundaciones, hay muchas pérdidas financieras cuando se trata de reparar los daños causados por las inundaciones. Ese es un problema tan grande aquí en el Área de Hartford”, dijo Velázquez.

To read the full article from El Sol News, click here.

Translation:

BRIDGEPORT – Hispanic leaders and environmental advocates met this week to address environmental issues that have historically marginalized those communities. The event was organized by the Commission on Women, Children, Seniors, Equity and Opportunity, along with the Acadia Center and Save the Sound. Historical disparities in the impacts of climate change have led to significant health problems within Hispanic communities, according to Alexander Rodríguez, an environmental justice specialist with Save the Sound. But even as some people move to places like Connecticut, the impacts of climate change are still present, according to Jayson Velázquez, climate and energy justice policy associate at the Acadia Center. “As flooding increases in coastal communities and our urban cities continue to be inundated with flood water, there are many financial losses when it comes to repairing flood damage. That is such a big problem here in the Hartford Area,” Velázquez said.

Massachusetts state climate chief lays out plan for big reforms, including changes to Mass Save

In a sweeping report issued on Wednesday, Melissa Hoffer, the state’s climate chief, presented a blueprint to move the state from planning to action. Her recommendations call for changes across state government, including reforming Mass Save, the state’s program to make homes and businesses more energy efficient.

The 87-page report includes 39 recommendations to meet the state’s ambitious targets laid out in its 2021 climate law, which calls for halving emissions below 1990 levels by the end of the decade and reaching net-zero emissions, contributing no additional planet-warming pollution to the atmosphere, by 2050.

Proposals include developing a plan with Massport to reduce the availability of certain short-hop flights, such as from Boston to New York, when rail options are available — an idea that will surely be a tough sell to airlines in a highly competitive market.

“I believe this is the most direct call we have seen from this administration that our current framework is falling short and that extensive reforms to the Commonwealth’s primary decarbonization engine are needed,” said Kyle Murray, Massachusetts program director for the clean energy advocacy group Acadia Center.

To read the full article from the Boston Globe, click here.

Will Maine Voters Choose to Take Over the State’s Two Largest Investor-Owned Utilities?

Voters in Maine are about to make a decision that will impact the state’s energy future for decades to come.

On Nov. 7, Maine residents will vote on Ballot Question 3 —  a choice to replace their investor-owned electric utilities, Central Maine Power and Versant Power, with a publicly owned alternative called Pine Tree Power.

That might sound like boring politics with little impact for the average US person. It’s not.

The outcome of the vote will be the first of its kind and has big implications for the rates that Maine electric customers pay, how fast the state transitions to renewable energy sources and could set the stage for other states to follow suit. The ballot question has created a fiery debate, with even environmental nonprofits disagreeing on which option is better.

“The consumer-owned utility model has uncertainty and change attached to it,” said Peter LaFond, senior policy advocate and Maine program director for the nonpartisan Acadia Center.

LaFond, who has not endorsed one side or the other, believes it’s more of “an indication that change is needed.”

“Things need to be governed differently to move forward into a green energy future that both reduces energy costs and reduces the carbon footprint,” said LaFond.

But the vote isn’t where this issue ends. Residents will still need to remain involved if they want their voice to be heard in the future of Maine’s energy decisions.

“Regardless of the outcome of the vote, things need to change,” LaFond said. “If we’re going to meet consumer, climate and energy goals, we have to move forward with a utility system that’s responsive to those.”

To read the full article from CNET, click here.

Rhode Island has cut greenhouse gases by 20% since 1990 — but has a long way to go

PROVIDENCE — Rhode Island has met the first interim target put in place by a landmark state climate law by reducing greenhouse gas emissions 20.1% below 1990 levels, the Department of Environmental Management reported Friday.

The level of reduction is more than double the 10% cut by 2020 mandated by the Act on Climate, the sweeping law signed by Gov. Dan McKee two years ago that forms the foundation of the state’s efforts to address climate change by electrifying cars and heating systems and ramping up the use of wind and solar power.

The 10% emissions-reduction target was set years ago by state policymakers and made binding with the 2021 passage of the Act on Climate. The next target, a 45% cut by 2030, will be much more difficult to reach. Indeed, modeling by Acadia Center and the Rocky Mountain Institute, clean energy groups working with the state, projects Rhode Island will fall just short of the target.

To read the full article from the Providence Journal, click here.

As climate change threatens the planet, CT Hispanic leaders address community impacts

Hispanic leaders and environmental advocates gathered this week to address environmental issues that have historically marginalized those communities. The event was organized by the Commission on Women, Children, Seniors, Equity & Opportunity, with Acadia Center and Save the Sound.

But even as some people may relocate to places like Connecticut, the impacts of climate change are still present, according to Jayson Velazquez, a climate and energy justice policy associate at Acadia Center.

“As floods increase in coastal communities, and as our urban cities continue to get inundated with flood water, there’s a lot of loss in finances when it comes to repairing flood damage,” Velazquez said. “That’s such a big issue up here in the Hartford area.”

Hispanics are 43% more likely to live in areas with the highest projected reductions in labor hours due to extreme temperatures, according to a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency report.

To read the full article from Connecticut Public Radio, click here.

Pandemic lockdown temporarily drove down R.I. carbon emissions

There’s nothing like a deadly virus to slash greenhouse gas emissions.

Fewer gas guzzlers on the road and planes in the sky during the COVID-19 pandemic proved instrumental to helping Rhode Island meet its 2020 greenhouse gas emissions benchmark, according to a new report by the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management (DEM).

The state’s Act on Climate law, passed in 2021, calls for incrementally decreasing Rhode Island’s greenhouse gas emissions over the next 27 years, with the goal of hitting net zero by 2050, as measured against a baseline emissions amount from 1990. A prior version of the law, called the Resilient Rhode Island Act, required the state to cut emissions by 10% compared with its 1990 baseline by 2020.

The 2020 Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory, published Friday, shows Rhode Island surpassed its 2020 goal, with the 9.24 million metric tons of carbon dioxide marking a 20.1% decline over its 1990 baseline.

Driving the rapid decrease: fewer cars and trucks on the road during COVID-19 era restrictions. While transportation remains the largest culprit of greenhouse gas emissions at 38%, total metric tons of carbon dioxide from gas-powered cars and trucks fell 11.6% over the prior year due to pandemic-related lockdowns, according to the report.

It also proved just how effective fewer cars and trucks on the road could be to reaching the state’s emissions mandates, said Emily Koo, senior policy director and Rhode Island program director for Acadia Center, a nonprofit based in Rockport, Maine. Koo also sits on the appointed panel known as the Executive Climate Change Coordinating Committee (EC4) Advisory Board.

“What I take away from the deep decline in transportation emissions is it’s really a demonstration of the kind of transformational societal change that’s required to reduce transportation emissions,” Koo said.

The big question: how to spur that societal change permanently, and, ideally, without a pandemic. It’s a monumental task that state agencies and environmental experts are still trying to answer.

Poccia was optimistic that there was time for improvement over the next 27 years, ahead of the 2050 deadline when state law mandates zero net emissions. Already, state data experts have honed their process, updating the accuracy and specificity with which they calculate emissions from various sources, such as methane leaks.

Koo was less worried about the three-year delay in reporting than the pace at which the state must push new emissions-friendly policies to meet its upcoming benchmarks.

“We had 20 years to cut 10% from our 1990 baseline, and now we have 30 years to do the remaining 90%,” she said. “That kind of imbalance worries me.”

To read the full article from the Rhode Island Current, click here.

Latine Legislators, Gov. Leaders, Academics, and Community Leaders Speak Up for Climate Justice in Forum Hosted by CWCSEO and Save the Sound

Hartford, CT – Following the conclusion of Hispanic Heritage Month/Latine Heritage Month, the Commission on Women, Children, Seniors, Equity, and Opportunity (CWCSEO) partnered with Save the Sound in convening a “Latino and Puerto Rican Voices for Climate Action Roundtable” featuring community leaders and academics, in addition to government and legislative officials. The event, held October 18 in Hartford, was convened to raise awareness about the remarkable contributions of leaders of Latin American ancestry to the environmental movement in Connecticut and sparked meaningful dialogue regarding how climate change impacts Latine communities and what should be done to combat the issue.

“Latine leaders in Connecticut’s environmental organizations are incorporating environmental justice principles in their approach to advocacy,” said Jayson Velazquez, climate and energy justice policy associate at Acadia Center, who delivered the keynote address. There is a balance between operating within systems to deescalate existing environmental, energy, and housing injustices while envisioning and building a just transition that repairs harm and prevents future injustices from occurring. Environmental organizations in Connecticut are responsible for playing a role in that process, and Latine leaders in these organizations must stay rooted in community.”

To read the full press release from Save the Sound, click here.

Achieving progress on environmental justice policy implementation: Community organizer and policymaker perceptions on equitable solutions

Urban environmental injustices are rooted in structurally racist discriminatory policy outcomes like segregation, redlining, highway construction, and deindustrialization. Uncovering policymakers’ and community organizers’ perceptions can guide equitable solutions to systemic environmental harms. To address decades of underinvestment and ongoing environmental injustices, Executive Order 14008 launched the Justice40 Initiative. Justice40 set a goal of directing 40 percent of the overall benefits of certain federal investment flows to address the following environmental justice program areas: climate change, clean energy, energy efficiency, clean transit, affordable housing, workforce development, cleanup of industrial pollution, and development of critical clean water and wastewater infrastructure. Justice40’s implementation processes must incorporate policymaker and organizer perspectives to ensure equitable program and policy design.

In an October 2022 article, researchers from RAND Corporation investigated the perceptions of community organizers and policymakers on existing and proposed environmental justice policies. Motivated by Justice40, the authors explore perceptions of environmental justice-oriented policy design and implementation processes. Published by the journal Environmental Justice, the researchers interviewed 19 environmental leaders across eight U.S. cities. They used a semi-structured interview guide and developed a codebook of shared patterns and concerns among organizers and policymakers. When asked about how environmental history shapes their current priorities, interviewees across sectors reported on the value of cultivating trust through meaningful engagement, prioritizing procedural and distributional equity, and demonstrating awareness of unintended consequences.

The authors find that gaining community organizers’ trust involves transparency, accountability, and avoiding false promises. Policymakers can address this challenge by committing to procedural and distributional equity in policy design and implementation. In this study, procedural equity prioritizes meaningful community engagement and consultation through scoping and decision-making processes. Distributional equity aims to ensure equitable percentages of benefits from solutions are allocated to historically underserved and underinvested communities. Interviewees in this study shared policies underway to tackle urban environmental injustices that align with Justice40’s goals.

Procedural and distributional equity also include community education and outreach. Organizers believe residents also need to know the connections between historical actions and current challenges. They advocate for educational programming on the systemic origins of environmental injustices. Across interviews, organizers named the ways discriminatory policy outcomes like segregation, redlining, racial covenants, highway construction, and deindustrialization entrenched environmental harm across generations. Yet organizers highlight a gap between these histories and current community perceptions and priorities.

The authors also called attention to the unintended consequences of environmental justice policy implementation. Across interviews, organizers and policymakers expressed concerns about green gentrification, affordable housing, and physical and cultural displacement. Accordingly, the study unveiled frustrations from community members when funding allocation and attention toward environmental justice policies disregard their broader economic, social, and political livelihoods. The authors’ analysis suggests combining environmental justice policy design with affordable housing and anti-displacement initiatives to ease these sentiments.

It is necessary to use policymaker and organizer perceptions on environmental justice policies as critical insight for Justice40 implementation. This study highlights the importance of embracing meaningful community engagement to avoid unintended consequences, such as gentrification and delayed investment in housing, parks, and infrastructure. Integrating procedural and distributional equity can help address urban environmental injustices and guide progress on policies aligned with the goals of Justice40.

Original Paper: Siddiqi, S. M., Mingoya-LaFortune, C., Chari, R., Preston, B. L., Gahlon, G., Hernandez, C. C., Huttinger, A., Stephenson, S. R., & Madrigano, J. (2022). The Road to Justice40: Organizer and Policymaker Perspectives on the Historical Roots of and Solutions for Environmental Justice Inequities in U.S. Cities. Environmental Justice, env.2022.0038. https://doi.org/10.1089/env.2022.0038

To read the original article in Yale Environment Review, click here.

Hydropower and Sustainable Development at Climate Week NYC

What is Climate Week NYC?

Climate Week NYC is the largest annual climate event of its kind, bringing together some 400 events and activities across the City of New York – in person, hybrid and online. Each year, business leaders, political change makers, local decision takers and civil society representatives of all ages and backgrounds, from all over the world, gather to drive the transition, speed up progress, and champion change that is already happening.

What event did Acadia Center specifically take part in?

Acadia Center president Dan Sosland was invited to join a panel of experts to discuss large-scale hydropower operations, climate, and sustainability issues. The International Hydropower Association (IHA) has developed a Hydropower Sustainability Standard (HSS) intended to provide an objective set of criteria to assess the operations of existing hydropower facilities. The HSS covers 11 major areas of hydropower operations, including ecosystem and community impacts.

The HSS was developed by NGOs, including the World Wildlife Federation, the Hydropower Sustainability Council, an independent NGO, and government and industry participants. Certification of a project indicates that it meets minimum sustainability expectations across a comprehensive range of topics using up-to-date and sector-specific sustainability guidance.

Hydro-Québec chose to become the first North American hydropower generator to seek certification, a process that began in May 2022 with the audit of its facilities at the Eastmain-1 Development.

In addition to Dan, panelists included prominent international environmental leader Ashok Khosla with the Hydropower Sustainability Council, who is credited with coining the concept of international sustainability, Gia Schneider, founder of Natel Energy, who works on innovation approaches to fisheries protection, and Margaret Trias, an international consultant expert in certification who was one of three independent assessors of the Eastmain-1 project. The panel was moderated by Carolyn Kissane, clinical professor at NYU and Director of the NYU SPS Energy, Climate Justice, and Sustainability (ECJS) Lab. Final words were provided by Aaron Mair, of the Adirondack Council, a leading environmental justice advocate in New York.

Why did Acadia Center specifically involve itself with this topic?

Acadia Center’s mission includes addressing climate and clean energy issues across the region of the northeast U.S. and eastern Canada. Cross-border interactions between these states and provinces occur in many ways. By taking an extensive view of the region, Acadia Center looks for opportunities to advance and assess climate solutions that cross borders when they provide climate, consumer and environmental benefits. Acadia Center’s Dan Sosland has been involved in numerous regulatory issues surrounding hydropower and watershed impacts and protection. Acadia Center has been directly involved in issues surrounding the role of Canadian hydro as a decarbonization pathway. Acadia Center is currently working with Canadian partners on a project called the Northeast Grid Planning Forum to encourage dialogue to explore the benefits on both sides of the border of greater cooperation between U.S. and Canadian power grids to meet climate, cost, reliability and clean energy goals.

What role will hydropower play in the future of clean energy and sustainable development?

Large-scale hydropower offers both benefits and impacts. The hydropower system in Quebec is extensive and provides low-cost electricity in Quebec and to U.S. states and cities. Reputable independent academic studies have concluded that the existing hydropower system in Quebec generates electricity at very low emission levels, approaching that of solar energy. However, large-scale hydropower can also have significant impacts on watersheds, cultural issues, and indigenous populations.

This event had some prominent panelists. What did you learn from them?

A key takeaway is that the Hydropower Sustainability Standard can significantly influence how a hydropower developer like Hydro-Quebec manages its system. As Joao Costa with the International Hydropower Association explained in a detailed presentation, like other certification approaches such as the U.S. EPA’s EnergyStar and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, hydro operations can be significantly and positively improved by evaluating against objective, best practices criteria.

What are the high-end takeaways from this event?

Hydropower currently plays a large role around the world as a low-cost and low-emission energy resource. The Hydropower Sustainability Standard can have a positive impact on hydropower operations, including ecological and cultural concerns. Future new developments, however, will depend upon whether a proposed project assesses the full scope of impacts and whether it has the support of local populations. Changes in operations and approaches are happening. For example, in the multi-billion Champlain Hudson Power Express transmission line project connecting Hydro-Quebec to New York City, the portion of the new transmission line in Canada will be jointly owned by the Mohawk community and Hydro-Quebec.

State finally unveils carbon reduction plan draft. Clock is ticking to ask questions and comment

The Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT) is now taking public comment on its long-awaited carbon reduction plan.

RIDOT published the 51-page draft online Wednesday and will accept input through Nov. 3 — 12 days before a final plan must be submitted to the Federal Highway Administration (FHA).

Under the federal government’s Bipartisan Infrastructure law passed in 2021, states are required to create a plan and submit it to the FHA  by November 2023 in order to receive funding for implementation — of which Rhode Island is slated to get more than $35.7 million over five years. Overall, Rhode Island is set to receive $576 million of federal funds between 2022 and 2026 to improve its transportation infrastructure.

Transit and climate activists say they’re glad Rhode Islanders can now have a say in the process. But they are concerned about the short timeframe RIDOT has to consider public comments with one month to go.

“I don’t expect to really get direct responses on what is and isn’t incorporated,” said Emily Koo, program director of the Acadia Center’s Rhode Island Chapter.

Koo was one of more than 20 advocates who sent a letter to RIDOT last month demanding that it release the plan for comment as soon as possible, much like Maine and Vermont did earlier in the year.

Though she lambasted the department’s stealth process in her letter, Koo said in a phone interview Friday that she did meet with DOT officials at an internal workshop in mid-September that “had a lot of forward-looking strategies.”

Still, Koo had several critiques of the draft plan, which includes strategies ranging from adding to RIDOT’s fleet of electric vehicles, sidewalk installations, bike path preservation, and greenway enhancements.

The carbon plan does acknowledge the need to do more beyond car infrastructure, but Koo said there are no clear commitments from the state.

“They say a lot, yet there isn’t any action,” Koo said.

Koo said there was plenty of discussion on the need for more multimodal transit  options at the internal meeting in September and hopes this will be considered in the final draft plan sent to the federal government.

“It would be incredible if DOT took any of them and funded them,” she said.

To read the full article from the Rhode Island Current, click here.