The first 100 days: A clean energy roadmap

2021 brings a changing of the guard in Washington, D.C.—a new Presidential administration will be sworn in and Congress will be full of newly-elected members. That means there’s a host of officials we need to educate about the many ways clean energy can lead our post-pandemic economy recovery while making meaningful progress in the fight against climate change. Our just-released 100-day roadmap will help the new leadership understand how to fully harness the power of clean energy: The Vision for Driving a Clean Energy Transformation.

The plan rests on four pillars, each of which will help deliver more affordable, reliable, clean power to American families and businesses:

• Expanding clean energy targets and carbon policies, which will drive renewable energy to meet climate and economic expansion targets
• Expanding interstate transmission to deliver renewables to consumers at the least cost
• Expediting federal permitting of renewables to ensure development can keep pace with clean energy goals
• Removing competitive barriers for renewable energy to reduce the costs of decarbonization

Crucially, the roadmap notes:

“[T]he transformation to clean energy in the electric sector is not only dependent on increasing generation from renewable sources, it will also require a holistic approach to ensuring transmission, permitting, market, and other relevant policy reforms that support and enable getting renewable power to consumers. This will require, among other things, significant investments in our nation’s grid and expediting permitting timelines for generation and transmission to ensure clean energy goals can be timely met.”

Policies built upon the foundation of these four pillars will create tens of thousands of well-paying jobs, spur investments in domestic manufacturing, and bring new revenues streams to rural communities throughout the country, all while creating cleaner air and reducing carbon emissions. You can read the full Vision for Driving a Clean Energy Transformation here and if you’re short on time and want the highlights, download the Executive Summary here.

Greg Alvarez