We’re Winning
Public Renewables
The New York Power Authority (NYPA) announced it’s more than doubling their public renewables plan. Now we need them to double it again. We know we need 15 gigawatts of public renewables to meet our climate goals, lower our energy bills, reduce air pollution, and create thousands of green union jobs. We have until September 12th, 2025 to demonstrate the overwhelming demand for NYPA to meet or climate goals and build a better New York at the same time.
To meet New York’s climate goals, NYPA must build 15 GW of public renewable energy by 2030. Increasing the plan to 7 GW is a step forward, but it remains a half-measure in the face of increasing climate devastation. NYPA must double its efforts and build the 15GW that New York needs—at a minimum— to comply with the CLCPA, lower electricity bills, create 25,000 green union jobs, and end our fossil fuel dependence.
As we face life-threatening heat waves, flash floods, skyrocketing energy bills, and an attack on climate action from the federal government, we need NYPA to lead the nation on building public renewables that will slash pollution, make energy more affordable, and protect our planet now.
The rapid addition of 4 additional GW of capacity in NYPA’s draft plan update shows NYPA can build even more than the 15GW necessary for us to meet the state’s climate goals. The strategic plan must go further by making the following revisions:
-Continue to increase the total planned capacity to at least 15 GW by 2030.
-Ramp up their pace of adding projects and beginning construction to take advantage of Federal solar and wind tax credits prior to their expiration.
-With IRA credits expiring, NYPA must commit to developing alternative financing methods to bring more renewables online regardless of federal tax credits such as expanded bond financing.
-Plan at least 5 GW of capacity for the Hudson Valley and downstate New York, with more attention to Distributed Energy Resources (DERs).
-Minimal proposed capacity is sited on public land or institutions. NYPA should substantially increase the number of such projects, in partnership with the Department of Education, MTA, and NYCHA.
-Plan additional projects on brownfield sites to turn polluted land to a positive use.
-Fully decarbonize our public schools by siting utility scale and distributed generation on SUNY and CUNY campuses and building enough capacity to meet their energy demands and related retrofits.
-Make all projects REACH eligible.
-Commit to building enough downstate generation projects to replace NYPA’s methane gas peaker plants by 2030, as required by law. Peaker plants are a public health disaster for host communities, which are already heavily burdened by other polluting infrastructure.