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At Least 11 Dead After Severe Flooding Sweeps The South; Hundreds Of Thousands Without Power; Abandoned Mine Land program frozen as Appalachia faces severe flooding; Solar power gives MN resort new blood, new life.

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Top Trump officials set to meet with Russian officials in Saudi Arabia over the Ukraine war. The GOP budget resolution is at risk as moderates weigh out consequences. New York City Mayor Eric Adams says he's "going nowhere."

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AZ Utilities Get Poor Grades for Progress Toward Clean-Energy Goals

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Wednesday, October 19, 2022   

Arizona's three major power utilities are doing a poor job of meeting the goals they set to transition from coal and gas to clean energy.

A new report from the Sierra Club found while many of the country's energy producers have pledged to clean up their power production, their promises often amount to little more than "greenwashing."

The report gives Arizona Public Service and Tucson Electric Power a "D," while the Salt River Project rated an "F."

Sandy Bahr, director of the Sierra Club's Grand Canyon chapter, said while all three companies have set ambitious goals toward lowering emissions, they remain hooked on carbon.

"What this report is saying is our utilities need to be a lot more aggressive in developing renewable energy and moving rapidly away from fossil fuels," Bahr explained.

The study found although the three utilities vowed to significantly reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions by 2030, they are not moving quickly enough to meet their targets. Bahr pointed out the Salt River Project earned an F partly because it plans to add more gas-powered plants to the grid, instead of renewables such as wind or solar.

The report warned if utility companies do not quickly ramp up clean energy and retire coal and gas power plants, the planet faces an increasingly dangerous future.

Bahr argued substituting natural gas for coal is a smoke-and-mirrors approach to slowing the pace of climate change.

"While we're starting to see more proposed coal retirements, at the same time we're seeing this massive ramp-up in gas plants," Bahr observed. "That's a huge concern from a public health perspective, but also for the climate."

Noah Ver Beek, energy campaigns analyst for the Sierra Club and the report's co-author, said the goal is to achieve 80% clean electricity by 2030 and 100% by 2035. Under current plans, only a quarter of existing coal and gas generation will be replaced by clean sources.

"Which is a significant addition of clean generation, but it is not nearly enough to replace all of the generating capacity that we have from fossil resources," Ver Beek contended. "We need four times that to actually replace all these dirty, emitting resources with good, effective clean energy."

Disclosure: The Sierra Club contributes to our fund for reporting on Climate Change/Air Quality, Energy Policy, Environment, Environmental Justice. If you would like to help support news in the public interest, click here.

References:  
Report Sierra Club 2022

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