The NYC City Council announced a bill this month to require major cuts in energy use by NYC’s large buildings, which are “by far the biggest source of carbon dioxide” pollution. Electricity and heating in buildings are responsible for approximately 70% of the city’s climate pollution, “with luxury towers producing the lion’s share.” The bill would require these buildings to reduce energy use by 20% by 2030, and sets forth the framework for increasing the cuts by 40-60% by 2050. Of particular note, the legislation, “[c]ombined with projected increases for renewable energy capacity on the power grid,” could reduce the city’s “climate-warming emissions by 80 percent.” https://www.huffingtonpost
Subsidies derived from New Jersey customer electric bill increases to be used to attract offshore wi
In an effort to encourage development and investment in offshore wind projects, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities released a draft rule, which would add a surcharge to customers’ electric bills. The draft rule establishes “offshore wind energy certificates (ORECs), which are the subsidies that utilities and their customers will pay for energy produced by zero-emission turbines miles off of [the NJ] coast.” The exact amount customers will pay is not indicated in the draft rule, as it depends on several variables such as “distance from land and electric generation potential.” The subsidies generated are intended to allow developers to recoup their investment over 20 years. https://www.a
NJ Attorney General Grewal announced this month that the state has filed six separate suits alleging violations of state law against potentially responsible parties for their contamination of sites in Newark, Atlantic City, and Middlesex and Warren Counties. Of particular note, “[t]hree of the lawsuits filed… mark the first time in a decade the state has filed new natural resource damages claims.” The other three suits are “’cost recovery’ cases seeking to reimburse taxpayers for work done by state agencies to clean up the contamination.” https://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2018/08/nj_is_about_to_bring_major_environmental_suits_in.html