News from multiple directions points to the importance of maintaining our commitment to renewable energy development. This week in CIB:

• Legislative Watch: Conservatives and Businesses Challenge REPS Repeal
• Administrative Watch: Opposition Grows to Duke Rate Hike
• Climate Change Update: US Greenhouse Gas Emissions Decline
• Education & Resources: A Short History of Craziness
• Conservationists: Green Tie Set for May 29

The staff and volunteers of NCLCV join this week in honoring the victims and heroes of the Boston Marathon bombings and their aftermath, including all those responsible for the identification and capture of the perpetrators.

Legislative Watch: Conservatives and Businesses Challenge REPS Repeal

Lawmakers considering the repeal of North Carolina’s Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard (REPS) through HB 298 need to be aware that they’re not just acting foolishly according to conservationists and clean energy advocates.

They’re also considering a boneheaded move according to conservatives and small business advocates.

No one can reasonably challenge the Conservative credentials of Carter Wrenn, the co-founder and long-time leader of Jesse Helms’ National Congressional Club and its successors. So when he calls attention to a conservative Republican legislator’s persuasive case in opposition to HB 298, the hysterically mis-named “Affordable and Reliable Energy Act”, responsible conservatives in the General Assembly ought to take serious note. As Wrenn points out, when the REPS policy under attack now was passed in 2007, George Bush (not Barack Obama) was president, and the bill containing REPS was supported by none other than Sen. Phil Berger, Rep. Thom Tillis, and nearly every other Republican in the legislature at that time.

Meanwhile, there are genuine small businesses in our state, existing here as part of (and only because of) the renewable energy boom growing out of the creation of REPS. They point to the existing and future jobs and economic growth dependent on renewable energy. Hundreds of new solar and other renewable energy businesses are pumping many millions of dollars into our state’s economy to make us already the number two state in the nation for new clean energy jobs last year. There’s more to come–unless HB 298 cuts off this much-needed source of jobs and economic growth.N.C. Sustainable Energy Association spokesperson Betsy McCorkle said, “If H298 passes, it will virtually eliminate the market for new renewable energy projects, since a free market does not exist where clean energy can compete head to head with the utilities. This will mean no new investments or jobs from clean energy in North Carolina. We will lose our competitive advantage with other states, and the jobs and investments will start going to our neighbors in South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia. [If it passes,] House Bill 298 signals that the rules are changing and clean energy investments are no longer welcome here.”

Administrative Watch: Opposition Grows to Duke Rate Hike

The latest Duke rate hike request is facing growing opposition in front of the N.C. Utilities Commission (NCUC). The NCUC has approved the N.C. League of Municipalities’ motion to intervene as a party in that case, representing cities and towns whose budgets would be strained further by yet another electric bill increase.

It appears that the Duke Energy plan to march its growing power plant construction costs through a recumbent state government and a placid public is not going as planned. State legislators and administration officials banking on an unchallenged blank check to Duke for more nuclear and coal plants need to reconsider, fast.

Climate Change Update: US Greenhouse Gas Emissions Decline

The newly released EPA greenhouse gas emissions inventory shows that fuel efficiency standards and the ongoing shift to less polluting sources of power production are beginning to produce results in controlling American emissions of greenhouse gases.

“U.S. emissions decreased by 1.6 percent from 2010 to 2011. Recent trends can be attributed to multiple factors including reduced emissions from electricity generation, improvements in fuel efficiency in vehicles with reductions in miles traveled, and year-to-year changes in the prevailing weather,” states a key summary point. The report also notes that emissions declined even further in the time between 2005 and 2011 as a whole–6.9 percent.

For the summary and a link to the entire report, see here.

Education & Resources: A Short History of Craziness

How did North Carolina enter the realm of national laughingstocks on climate science?

An enlightening article in Earth magazine recounts the history of anti-scientific distortion in the “debate” on sea-level rise in North Carolina. (Earth is a publication of the American Geosciences Institute.)

Alas, this is not an isolated incident. Followers of scientific denial are now in positions of power in both the legislative and executive branches of our state government. The fight for basing our environmental, energy, and natural resource policy decisions on sound science is an ongoing fight for the future of our state.

Conservationists: Green Tie Set for May 29

Make your plans now to take part in the 2013 NCLCV Green Tie Awards Dinner in Raleigh the evening of Wednesday, May 29. Help honor the environmental heroes fighting to protect our health, land, air, water and wildlife in a very tough legislative environment. For more details and to register, go here.