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congestion pricing
Electing Our Future: NYC Needs a Climate-Conscious Mayor
Let us use Eric Adams’ indictment as a moment to not only address the city’s corruption but to turn the page from a local government complacent with climate inaction to one that is invested in climate justice.
Oct 23, 2024
Hurricanes Helene and Milton have once again brought climate change to the attention of many voters. With so much dialogue regarding hurricane response directed toward the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the president, it is important to remember that local governments play a vital role in climate change initiatives.
Local governments are significant actors in climate change mitigation and adaptation efforts through city policy, zoning decisions, funding distributions, and the enforcement of emissions laws. As New York City grapples with the indictment of Mayor Eric Adams and a fast-approaching mayoral election, residents should look south for motivation.
NYC needs a mayor that is a champion for the climate justice movement to curb emissions, increase local resilience, and build adaptive capacity to help avoid the catastrophic scenarios witnessed this month from Florida to North Carolina.
Reign of Error
Following the “reign,” as he recently put it, of Mayor Eric Adams, the city’s emissions projections remain bleak. In 2022, according to the emissions inventories provided by the Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice, New York City released 53.7 million tons of carbon-dioxide equivalent into the atmosphere, a 17% decrease from the city’s 2005 benchmark. This is markedly short of the city’s goal to reduce emissions by 40% (from the benchmark) by 2030 and clearly not on track for the goal to achieve an 80% reduction by 2050.
According to the “One City, Built to Last” report released in 2014 under Mayor Bill de Blassio, two-thirds of these emissions reductions will need to come from building efficiency. A goal of 35% building emissions reduction by 2025 was set under this plan. Now, just two months from 2025, the reduction of buildings emissions is just 22%. Law 97, an attempt to decrease building emissions by 40% by 2030, has proven to be largely ineffective. The penalty set in place by the law is much too low for the world’s top financial and real estate companies at just $268 dollars per ton of carbon over the limit. Also, with only 30 staff members dedicated to enforcing the law, the estimated 3,700 buildings that are not complying with the law may never be held accountable. Additionally, Mayor Adams has created another loophole for these non-compliers, Renewable Energy Credits that will allow the owners of these buildings to buy credits to offset their emissions while maintaining their dangerous emissions levels.
Transportation, the second largest emitting sector in the city, has decreased only 3% from the 2005 benchmark. The vast majority of transportation emissions comes from on-road vehicles, 58% of which are privately owned according to a recent New York Times report. A policy passed by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to decrease the number of vehicles in the city, Congestion Pricing, was shot down by Gov. Kathy Hochul before it even took effect. The response from Mayor Adams? He undermined the policy by agreeing with the governor’s decision. NYC was set to be the first city in the country to introduce congestion pricing, which may have served as a model and had a lasting impact on the future of green cities in the U.S..
A City in Peril
As Eric Adams continues to pander to the financiers of the fossil fuel industry, (who helped fund his campaign) and ultra-wealthy real estate owners, climate change projections for the city are becoming increasingly frightening. The New York City Panel on Climate Change (NPCC) 2022 report on climate risks states that sea level rise (SLR), flooding, and heatwaves will be among the most threatening climate change impacts for the city.
SLR estimates are dependent on global trends in emissions and associated warming so are difficult to predict on a local level. At the low end of the NPCC estimates, SLR is expected to reach 12 inches by 2050 and, at the high end, 23 inches. By the end of the century, SLR will be between 25 and 65inches, making many low-lying areas like Brighton Beach, Rockaway Beach, and Midland Beach uninhabitable, and leaving areas across NYC extremely vulnerable to flooding. Increasingly intense and unpredictable tropical storms and cyclones will make Superstorm Sandy level events more frequent, consequently threatening lives and depleting disaster recovery funding.
Heatwaves are expected to increase in frequency and intensity, which could be detrimental for New Yorkers living and working in an already deadly heat island that claims 350 lives per year. Extreme heat events are increasing at a rate of 0.47 days per decade in Central Park and about one day per decade at LaGuardia. Heatwaves and increasing temperatures will affect low-income communities disproportionately where the heat island effect is greatest due to a lack of tree coverage and green spaces.
The Case for a Climate Justice Mayor
Let us use Eric Adams’ indictment as a moment to not only address the city’s corruption but to turn the page from a local government complacent with climate inaction to one that is invested in climate justice. We need a mayor that does not have deep ties with the funders of global warming but one that has deep ties in community organizing. We need a mayor that understands the dire consequences climate change will have on the city, from the economy to people’s livelihoods. We need a mayor that can help transform the city into a living example of a sustainable and equitable city. We need a mayor that cares about the future.
Of course, a mayor alone cannot not fix the plethora of climate change related issues the city is facing. But here is what a climate and community focused mayor could do for the city.
- Use New York City’s political and economic power to challenge Gov. Hochul when she makes irresponsible decisions, like shooting down Congestion Pricing and refusing to sign the Climate Change Superfund Act.
- Enforce existing buildings emissions caps and propose stricter emissions laws.
- Advocate for zoning laws that will promote renewable energy production.
- Create building codes that require greater energy efficiency while simultaneously ensuring infrastructural resilience to climate change impacts.
- Increase the pace of electrifying the city’s fleets and adding solar to all public buildings.
- Work directly with low-income communities to increase their climate resilience while protecting the areas from climate gentrification.
- Work directly with young activists and students who will be affected by climate change for their entire lives.
- Stop cop city, as it is part of a carceral system that disproportionately affects Black and brown communities, leading to inequity and increased vulnerability.
- Divert funding from the police system to climate change initiatives, homelessness services, and community organizations.
- Fix the city’s corruption.
As we saw this month in the South, entire cities’ futures rest on our ability to mitigate climate change and adapt to its powerful impacts. A climate justice mayor will lower the city’s emissions and increase the city’s resilience and adaptive capacity by focusing on improving social services; ending the city’s corruption; and working directly with civic groups, young people, and low-income communities. New Yorkers and the media must make climate justice the forefront of campaign issues as the mayoral election heats up.
Sunrise Movement NYC is a youth movement pushing to replace Eric Adams with a mayor who takes bold action to make environmental, economic, and racial justice the NYC standard. Follow the Sunrise Movement NYC Hub or @sunrisemvmtnyc on instagram to get involved and learn more about the future we are fighting for.
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Democratic Climate Heroes... and Villains
The reminder that there’s no automatic connection between a D next to your name and some courage on climate comes from many spots around the country, including in the deep blue Northeast.
Aug 23, 2024
Much of my past month has been spent Kamaling—I don’t know if I hold the record, but along with helping organize and MC the Elders for Kamala call, I’ve made cameos on Climate Leaders for, Oudoor and Conservation Leaders for, Christians for, and Vermonters for. I’m for. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz have run a sparkling campaign so far, and this week’s convention in Chicago is a reminder that Democrats look and sound like America at its best. As opposed to the monochrome and bitter gathering that nominated former President Donald Trump (“Mass Deportations Now”), it’s been one long Party party. (When Patti LaBelle kicked off Tuesday night’s proceedings, the musician gap with the GOP grew unbridgeably wide).
Which is not to say that Harris will be a sterling climate president—we’ll have to wait and see, because we had no primary to press her on it. I don’t like long campaigns any more than anyone else, but in our system they are the only place activists can actually make a forceful case—that’s how climate became a real presidential issue for the first time in the 2020 race, which led quite directly to the Inflation Reduction Act. (And now, instead of a second-term Democrat freed to act with relative abandon, we’ll have a first-termer constrained by thoughts of her re-elect). So we’ll doubtless have to push her, once we’ve helped push her into the White House.
The reminder that there’s no automatic connection between a D next to your name and some courage on climate comes from many spots around the country, including even some where lots of good work has been done. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Coach Walz have gotten high high marks—converting narrow legislative margins into big action packages.
But places where it should be easier—in the deep blue, not the purple— haven’t gone as well. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s California has accomplished a lot with the move to solar power, as I’ve been writing about all spring—but he also has gutted both rooftop solar and community solar this spring. According to the Solar Rights Alliance, 22% of all solar jobs in the state have disappeared. That’s just stupid policy: Rooftop solar, among other things, has dramatically decreased the amount of electricity the grid needs to provide, which may be why the utilities hate it. (Texas Republicans, meanwhile, have made one attempt after another to gut renewables, but they may have waited too long—there’s enough money behind wind and sun now to defeat such efforts, and the state’s renewables, and just as importantly its battery fleet, are now growing like topsy.)
The closer we move to actual implementation of the big climate promises that politicians made during the Greta years, the more of this kind of backsliding we’re going to see.
And on the other side of the country, in the deep blue Northeast?
New York could and should be a renewable powerhouse. It lacks a Mojave Desert, but Long Island Sound could be the Qatar of offshore wind—the DOE estimates it could power 11 million homes, which is 4 million more homes than New York contains. With NYSERDA, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, it has some of the finest energy conservation minds in the country. And it has an environmentally minded populace—everyone thinks about New York City as a liberal bastion, but it was upstaters who banded together to force a ban on fracking.
And yet the state is lagging badly, in no small part thanks to Gov. Kathy Hochul. The Buffalo-area pol, who ascended more or less accidentally to her job when Andrew Cuomo couldn’t stop grabbing the women who worked for him, got perhaps her biggest moment of infamy earlier this year when, out of nowhere, she shifted 180° her position on congestion pricing in lower Manhattan and nixed the program—weeks after she’d given a long speech extolling it, and past the point where the city and state had spent hundreds of millions of dollars buying the cameras to make it work.
But that’s not her only anti-climate act. She’s also sat on her hands for months now after the state legislature passed the Climate Superfund act, which would send the bill for climate disasters to the oil companies that caused them. (You can sign a petition for the Superfund here). And now she’s “pondering” a “relaxation” of the state’s basic climate law, which promises to use renewables for 70% of the state’s power by 2030. According to Inside Climate News, she told reporters recently that “the goals are still worthy. But we have to think about the collateral damage of these decisions. Either mitigate them or rethink them.”
Why? Well, because she’s hearing from groups like
the Business Council of New York State ... They want to go beyond pushing back CLCPA deadlines. They hope to rewrite the law itself, targeting mandates to electrify buildings, passenger vehicles, and school buses.
“We are now at a point where implementation challenges call for a reassessment of the underlying statutory mandates,” the Business Council said July 30 while releasing a letter to Hochul signed by 60 business, fossil fuel, labor, farming, and small business groups.
This is the kind of utterly predictable pushback that confident legislators simply manage with a few well-chosen words, even as they push forward. (See, Joe Biden). But Hochul shows no sign of that kind of confidence. NYRenews, the group that has helped push much of the New York legislation, released a report yesterday showing that under Hochul’s leadership, the state’s four key implementation agencies are sitting on their hands.
Only a handful of agencies have issued specific guidance or regulations to support compliance efforts. Notably, it appears that the state’s largest and most powerful agencies have entirely failed to comply with the Climate Act and have not yet issued policies or guidance on implementation of the law.
For example:
• The New York State Department of Transportation (“NYSDOT”) has pushed forward at least 40 highway expansion projects without properly assessing their impacts on DACs and the climate;
• Empire State Development (“ESD”) has awarded at least $780 million in clean energy funding without ensuring that 40% of the benefits go to DACs;
• The New York Education Department (“NYSED”) has approved at least 25,971 construction projects at public schools across the state without properly assessing their climate and DAC impacts; and
• The New York State Department of Health (“NYSDOH”) has approved at least 223 construction projects for new and renovated healthcare facilities without assessing or mitigating their climate impacts.
This is where leadership makes a difference, one way or the other. You need some nerve—(something like, though in reverse, the chutzpah of the New York Republican legislator who last week penned an op-ed explaining that this summer’s violent storms were a reason to postpone climate action). Hochul, casting New York’s votes at the convention Tuesday night, cited the Empire State as the birthplace of the women’s rights and gay rights movement. If she were smart she’d listen to impassioned voices from the climate movement, who also know something about reality: Listen to Bob Howarth, the world-leading methane scientist who also sits on the board charged with implementing the new law.
“I am appalled at this pushback against the CLCPA by business interests pushing their short-sighted agenda,” Howarth told WaterFront. “Climate change is very real. The consequences of climate disruption (floods, droughts, fires, crop failures) are becoming increasing obvious to all.”
“The political leaders of NY understood these dangers when they drafted the CLCPA and its predecessor beginning in 2015…. Due to political delay, we may miss CLCPA targets by a few years. But the needed trajectory remains clear.”
Howarth sits on the state’s Climate Action Council, which passed a plan to implement CLCPA in December 2022 (by a vote of 19-3). The council had determined that “it was entirely possible and reasonable to meet the CLCPA goals and targets… that would benefit individual homeowners,” Howarth said.
Furthermore, the successful implementation of CLCPA would set an example to the world by showing “that a globally important economy could thrive while addressing the climate crisis and moving away from fossil fuels,” he added.
But the council hasn’t met for many months. “The state simply has not seen adequate political leadership to move ahead with the CLCPA goals and the council’s plan,” he said.
Something similar is happening in New York City where Mayor Eric Adams, in between dealing with corruption investigations, has done his best to weaken the city’s landmark Law 97. As Pete Sikora of New York Communities for Change explained to me, he’s pushed back the implementation date for the statute, which mandates efficiency improvements in big buildings. (Not surprisingly, he’s taken lots of campaign money from real estate interests).
The two year delay he's created will cost thousands of jobs and raise pollution yearly by a few hundred thousand tons per year as landlords put off energy efficiency projects (more worrying: it's a signal he'll further weaken the law if reelected and the major pollution limit starts in 2030).
But Adams—well, he’s also attempting to turn one of the city’s neighborhood landmarks, the Elizabeth Street Garden, into a housing complex. The city needs housing, which is why the garden’s friends have come up with all kinds of alternate sites in the same neighborhood, but so far he hasn’t yielded, even thought even Murdoch’s New York Post has made it clear what a bad idea the development is. Now, the Timesreports, there’s been a huge letter-writing campaign from local public school students.
For the 575 or so students who attend P.S. 130, Elizabeth Street Garden serves as an extension of the classroom. The elementary school lacks green space, but it is only a 10-minute walk from the garden, allowing for frequent visits and class trips. So the garden has become a de facto playground and nature center where the children can plant seeds, learn about nature, and have Easter egg hunts.
“Tree’s also provide homes for animals like birds, squirrels, and raccoons. This is why we should save the garden!” wrote one student.
Another explained, “The garden adds color and brightness to the city.”
Many were concerned about their favorite play space disappearing: “One reason why we should keep the garden is because with all the trees, we can play hide and seek and eat lunch.”
One reason that pols like Hochul and Adams can get away with moves like this is that there’s very little coverage—the Elizabeth Street garden is the exception that proves the rule. Indeed, the Times announced last week that it would no longer endorse candidates for local office, which is odd since those were probably the only endorsements the paper made that actually moved voters. Albany, meanwhile, exists in a news vacuum—the number of voters who know that Hochul is emerging as a northern DeSantis on climate issues is minuscule.
The closer we move to actual implementation of the big climate promises that politicians made during the Greta years, the more of this kind of backsliding we’re going to see. Consider, just as a random example, Connecticut, where utility regulators have introduced an excellent system of performance-based regulation for power providers, moving away from the old system which basically just takes a utility’s costs and adds a chunk of profit on top. The Nutmeg State’s two big utilities have fought it from the start, and now they’re moving to have the regulator who introduced it, Marissa Gillett, fired. The state’s governor, Ned Lamont, said when the law was introduced that “you just don’t get paid an automatic 9% whether you do good work or bad work. You get paid for doing good work.” Now we’ll see if he has the courage to keep her at her job. Or Massachusetts, where the legislature adjourned without taking up the crucial enabling legislation for the state’s climate law—there’s some talk that governor (and climate hawk) Maura Healey might call them back for a special session, but more likely it will drag on for another year. Delay is the new denial.
Or take Delaware—the state needs to develop its offshore wind resources to meet climate goals. Indeed, given its relatively small population, it could become a linchpin for the entire Atlantic seaboard. But though polling shows strong support across the region, well-financed opponents have successfully made it appear that grassroots opposition is growing, particularly in coastal communities. I’ve watched it happen in Cape Cod, where activists are trying to block the cable necessary to bring power onshore from turbines, and in Maine where other activists want to block the construction of the terminal to support the offshore farms. There are always arguments—perfect enemy of the good—but none of them make much sense in a world where August looks like it will be even hotter than last year’s all-time record. It’s why, when real champions emerge—say, former National Wildlife Federation CEO Collin O’Mara, running in the Democratic primary for Delaware governor—change gets so much easier.
The default is always to the status quo. For Republicans that means fossil fuel uber alles. For Democrats, too often, it means “don’t ruffle more feathers than you have to.” That’s why we always have to make sure that there are plenty of climate hawks with plenty of feathers.
Correction: An earlier version of this op-ed mistakenly identified Gretchen Whitmer as the governor of Wisconsin. She is the governor of Michigan.
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New Yorkers Can’t Afford for Gov Hochul to Keep Delaying Climate Action
As we gear up for another summer of extreme weather events, we need our elected leaders to understand the urgency for action.
Jun 12, 2024
This past weekend, the New York State Assembly finally got its act together and passed an urgent piece of climate legislation, the Climate Change Superfund Act. Designed to make fossil fuel corporations pay for the damage they have done to the environment, the bill, initially passed by the Senate earlier this spring, now heads to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s desk. It is imperative that the governor, after consistently backing down on climate this year, signs this bill into law.
Gov. Hochul’s reticence to pursue climate action is, at this point, well-established. Just last week, she made headlines for slamming the brakes on a congestion pricing initiative that was supposed to take effect later this month. The impending tolls would have reduced traffic in downtown Manhattan, improved air quality, and funded much-needed upgrades to public transit. Combined with the Inflation Reduction Act’s groundbreaking federal investments in clean energy nationwide, congestion pricing would have moved our state one step closer to a sustainable future. Instead, Gov. Hochul chose to play petty politics with the livability of our city.
Last month, as I prepared for another summer of extreme weather events in New York City, I joined hundreds of climate activists in Albany to demand that the state legislature pass the Superfund Act and another climate-related bill—the HEAT Act. I marched through the halls of the State Capitol, linking arms with climate activists of all faiths, holding banners, chanting songs, and demanding climate action from the New York State Assembly and Gov. Hochul.
Should Gov. Hochul fail to act, here’s what we can expect more of: a hotter New York City, plagued by more frequent and more severe storms, flooding, and air pollution.
Gov. Hochul’s behavior is forcing us to take action. Not even two months ago, she chose to exclude the NY HEAT and Climate Superfund Acts from the annual state budget. Then she backed down on congestion pricing. As the days heat up, it’s more important than ever that our elected officials deliver on their promise to ensure a liveable future for our communities here in New York City.
Last summer, extreme weather wreaked havoc across our city. Between smoky skies and flooded streets, city life was consistently derailed by out-of-control weather conditions. September 2023 was the wettest September in New York City in over a century. And, a year later, we seem headed into another stormy summer. In late May, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warned that 2024 will see above-normal hurricane activity.
These extreme weather events and others are a direct result of climate change. Canadian wildfires are getting more intense as a hotter and drier fire season becomes the norm. Warmer ocean temperatures are fueling stronger tropical storms, and climate change is making heatwaves more frequent and more extreme. These are ramifications of climate change that our governor needs to take seriously: Inaction simply isn’t an option.
This August will mark two years since President Joe Biden signed the most significant piece of climate legislation in American history into law. The Inflation Reduction Act devoted $370 billion to lowering energy costs for American households, building out clean energy, and other climate solutions. In New York State, IRA capital is already starting to flow to consumers. Since 2023, New Yorkers have been eligible for tax credits that make buying an electric vehicle, upgrading home heating and cooling systems, and replacing inefficient refrigerators more affordable. A few weeks ago, New York became the first state to offer rebates to low- and middle-income New Yorkers who want to make clean-energy upgrades to their homes. Passing the Superfund and HEAT Acts, and reversing her ill-advised decision on congestion pricing, is simply the most sensible thing for Gov. Hochul to do.
New York City is already suffering from a bad case of the heat island effect, a phenomenon where dense urban areas experience higher temperatures than surrounding rural areas, largely due to vehicular traffic. We cannot afford to let unregulated vehicle traffic continue to overheat our city. Should Gov. Hochul fail to act, here’s what we can expect more of: a hotter New York City, plagued by more frequent and more severe storms, flooding, and air pollution.
My worries about the risks of inaction are exactly why I made the trip to Albany earlier this spring. As we gear up for another summer of extreme weather events, we need our elected leaders to understand the urgency for action. Gov. Hochul can’t continue to ignore the climate crisis. She must reverse her position on congestion pricing, sign the Superfund Act, and steer the HEAT Act into law. We simply can’t afford to play politics or wait any longer.
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