Category Archives: Wind

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Renewable Energy Under Attack in Two Dozen States

Recent attacks on state support for renewable energy in solar-rich Arizona are part of a nationwide trend.

Solar panels cover the roof of a parking garage at Arizona State University in Tempe. (Photo by Osha Gray Davidson)

At InsideClimate News today, Maria Gallucci writes:

Over the past few years, a rising tide of legislation has sought to repeal or weaken renewable portfolio standards RPS, which require a certain share of a state’s electricity supply to come from sources like solar and wind. Lesser known are the few lawsuits filed to challenge the constitutionality of these laws.

Many of these attempts have fizzled, but some are being revived this year. In total, 42 efforts are wending their way through legislatures and courts in more than two dozen states, according to the North Carolina Solar Center, a clearinghouse for state renewable energy policies.

“The danger of some of these [RPS laws] being repealed is a little bit greater this year than it was last year,” said Justin Barnes, a senior policy analyst at the center.”

While Republicans are behind most of these anti-renewable attacks (unsurprisingly), Gallucci points to a more specific source.

The biggest push is coming from the American Legislative Exchange Council ALEC, a 40-year-old industry group with free-market views that drafts and pushes legislation and that sees renewable energy mandates as an overreach of government authority.

via Renewable Energy Standards Target of Multi-Pronged Attack | InsideClimate News.

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Arizona Commissioner: Solar Energy Incentives a “Monster”

Gary Pierce insists he’s a “friend of solar.” Recent actions by the Arizona Corporation Commissioner to cut solar incentives in Arizona, however, make that claim…let’s just say: “questionable.”

Arizona Corporation Commissioner Gary Pierce

Arizona Corporation Commissioner Gary Pierce

Exhibit A: Check out the video below in which Pierce calls the state’s performance-based incentive for renewable power, “a monster” that needs to be tamed.

Pierce offered an amendment last week to lower the amount of renewable power utilities would have to generate — a move that the industry says would “cut them off at the knees,” leading to cancelled projects, slower growth, and lost jobs.

Sheesh.

Just imagine the policies Pierce would support if he were an enemy of solar.