Energy Justice in New York State: Opportunities and Challenges in NY's Climate Law

​Jasmine Graham spoke to Bard College's Masters in Environmental Policy (MEP) students about New York's Climate Act. 

Graham examines New York’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) justice provisions around disadvantaged communities and equity frameworks. Jasmine also discussed avenues of participation for policymakers, as well as current policy proposals and New York State initiatives The conversation on energy justice centered around four pillars: Equity, Affordability, Access and Participation.

“You want to have equity in the distribution of benefits and burdens. You want to have affordability of energy costs. You want to have access to opportunities and technologies, and you want to make sure that communities have participation in decision making. Those paired with some of the long-standing kind of environmental justice principles are the values that folks should be using when designing good policy. But, it's not that simple.”

The discussion also highlights the need to move beyond simply seeking access and affordability and towards a framework of ownership, self-determination, and reparations for past harm:

“We do want to access, and that is a fair way to characterize it. But we also want ownership. We don't just want access to community solar. We don't want just a 10% bill discount. We want to own our own solar. We don't want to just participate in the existing processes, we want self determination [...] We don't want just an energy bill that is manageable. We actually want reparations. We want repair for the harm that has been done, and through the line of all of this is that we want equity, and in wanting equity you need to take into account the harm of the past.”

Graham left Bard students with many takeaways: the importance of stakeholder engagement with community members may very well have been one of the most important:
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“Ultimately we want to get to this place where we are actually deferring to the communities where we're going beyond inserting ourselves and where these communities are able to self-govern, where they can have community driven, decision making, and where they are empowered to represent themselves.”

Watch the full video here.