ALBANY, N.Y. -- Regulators, decision makers and environmentalists will gather in Albany next week to discuss how to achieve New York's ambitious goal for switching to renewable energy.

The theme of this year's Alliance for Clean Energy annual fall conference is "50 by 30: Implementing New York's Clean Energy Future." According to Ann Reynolds, executive director of the organization, achieving 50 percent renewable energy in New York by 2030 will be challenging, but doable.

"If we can get there, we will achieve benefits in terms of air quality, local economic development, diversifying our energy supply,” Reynolds said. “And we will be reducing the carbon emissions that cause global warming."

The conference is scheduled for November 2 and 3. It will include discussions of New York's Clean Energy Standard, legislative issues, energy markets and a keynote address by President Obama's chief energy and climate change adviser.

Governor Andrew Cuomo has made 50 percent renewable power by 2030 official state policy. State Energy Czar Richard Kaufman, who also will address the conference, said achieving that mandate will mean integrating renewable energy sources into the state's electric system in new and different ways.

"A hybrid electric system which is made up of large scale power plants as well as smaller scale distributed solutions where electrons flow in more than one direction and where supply and demand are dynamic,” Kaufman said.

He added that the governor's energy plan, called Reforming the Energy Vision, also includes significant policy initiatives for utilities to increase energy efficiency.

A year ago, getting to 50 percent renewable energy by 2030 was still an idea, Reynolds said. And the 2015 conference was focused on demonstrating that the goal was attainable.

"We're so thrilled that over the course of this year we now have a mandate for 50 percent renewable energy in New York,” she said. "Now, though, we have to get into brass tacks about how can we achieve it, how can it be implemented, what are the details?"

Information about the conference is available here.



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Local officials concerned about climate change are calling on the Biden Environmental Protection Agency to adopt strict national clean car standards - like the ones the Golden State has already embraced.

The California Air Resources Board recently adopted new rules that will phase out the sale of new gas-powered vehicles by 2035.

Alex Walker-Griffin, the vice mayor of the town of Hercules in the Bay Area, said California's new rules are intended to cut vehicle pollution 60% by 2030.

"By 2026," said Walker-Griffin, "car dealerships have to have a plan for the phasing of electric, hydrogen, and hybrid vehicles into their fleets that they sell."

More than 600 local officials from across the country, part of a group called Elected Officials to Protect America, have signed a letter asking the EPA to start the rulemaking process for stringent clean-car standards.

The agency says the transportation sector accounts for 27% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.

Neighborhood Council Member Andrew Lewis from North Westwood, near UCLA, said he suspects the extreme heat and rain that recently pounded Southern California is linked to climate change.

"So to go from, literally on the same day, a heat wave into hurricane impacts," said Lewis, "which created a Miami-like atmosphere here in Los Angeles, something's wrong, something's got to change."

State Sen. Will Haskell - D-Westport - is a 26-year-old from Connecticut. He also signed the letter.

"I worry about whether my generation is going to have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink," said Haskell, "or if policymakers are going to stick their head in the sand and watch the point of no return go by."

The Inflation Reduction Act, which passed this summer, is poised to invest $369 billion into climate action, including $7.5 billion to build a network of charging stations, every 50 miles on interstate highways.

Oregon has officially axed a gas-fired power plant near the Columbia River.

The Oregon Energy Facility Siting Council terminated the site certificate for the proposed Perennial Wind Chaser Station in Umatilla County.

Audrey Leonard, staff attorney for Columbia Riverkeeper, said the decision is a victory for the climate.

"If built, the facility would have been one of the largest greenhouse gas emitters in Oregon," Leonard pointed out. "Over its 30-year life cycle, the plant would have emitted at least 30 million tons of greenhouse gas pollution, which means it also would have locked the state into 30 more years of reliance on fracked gas."

Plans for the plant date back to 2015. Since then, Perennial Power Holdings, the company behind the plant, has struggled to find a buyer for the power that would be generated.

Since it was first announced, the state has committed to strong climate goals. In 2020, Gov. Kate Brown directed state agencies to cut carbon emissions in Oregon by 80% within the next three decades.

Leonard noted the decision came after a lot of hard work from the communities opposing the plant.

"The victory really belongs to those who came out and spoke out and filed comments and really did the hard work there," Leonard acknowledged.

She added the fight over fracked gas and polluting energy sources isn't over in Oregon. She pointed to the GTN Xpress Project, which would increase the capacity for fracked gas along a 1,300-mile long pipeline running from British Columbia to California.

Oregon, Washington and California are calling on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to reject this project.

The political divide over climate change seems well entrenched, but a recent study suggested the conventional wisdom is wrong.

The study, published in Nature Communications, found support for climate policies much higher than most think. While the average person believes support for climate action is around 43%, researchers found the actual level is between 66% and 80%.

Sergio Vargas, climate policy organizer for the Illinois Environmental Council, said our sense of isolation is a roadblock.

"I think the big problem that the study suggests is, it's very hard to rally these people together because they feel like they're alone in this fight," Vargas explained. "When in reality there is so much support that exists. "

The study uses the term "pluralistic ignorance" to describe the shared misperception. It calls the false idea an impediment to collective action.

Researchers found in every state and in every demographic studied, Americans underestimate support for the climate action.

Gregg Sparkman, assistant professor of psychology at Boston College and the study's co-author, said people tend to conform to what they think others believe and don't bring the issue up.

"By not talking about it, we kind-of confirm to the people who are looking at us that people don't seem to be concerned, and then the cycle kind-of continues where I don't think others are concerned," Sparkman outlined. "Because no one talks about it, then you get what's called a 'spiral of silence.'"

The study looked at a carbon tax, citing renewable-energy projects on public lands and the so-called "Green New Deal." It found supporters of climate action outnumber opponents two to one, but Americans falsely perceive nearly the opposite is true.

Sparkman emphasized policymakers underestimate the support for laws which could make a difference. He noted the study found conservatives underestimated support the most, but liberals do as well. He added television can be another factor in confirming bias if people do not watch programs showing people who care.

"Or if they do, they portrayed as an idiosyncratic character who's weird in their concern about the environment, and maybe they're the butt of a lot of jokes are something like that," Sparkman observed. "I think these kinds of portrayals might be a disservice to portraying the fact that a supermajority of Americans are actually worried about climate change."