By J. Drake Hamilton, science policy director, Fresh Energy

Wondering how decision makers are doing on creating rules for a low carbon economy? In 2007, the Minnesota legislature passed the Next Generation Energy Act, including setting science-based goals for global warming pollution reductions in Minnesota. We need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across the economy by at least 30 percent by 2025, and 80 percent by 2050. The state’s Climate Change Advisory Group recommended actions needed to meet those reduction targets; in November, citizens will elect a new legislature and governor that will be responsible for enacting – or not enacting – the policy actions needed to unleash Minnesota’s clean energy jobs potential. At the federal level, in 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an economy-wide limit on carbon pollution. Now in spring 2010, the U.S. Senate may be ready to act on a comprehensive energy and climate bill to address this urgent economic and environmental issue.

You can keep informed about the Senate debate by following the Fresh Energy blog; we’ll be posting ongoing updates and analyses. And come to a free public presentation to  get your questions answered: Fresh Energy staff will be speaking around Minnesota this spring on the state of federal action to support clean energy jobs and address climate change. I hope to see you at one of these events. The first opportunity is this coming Wednesday, May 5, in Shoreview, Minnesota. Download the event flyer.

If you’d like to schedule a presentation for your company or in your community, please email me directly at hamilton@fresh-energy.org.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 29th, 2010 at 1:24 pm by Fresh Energy and is filed under Energy, Global Warming. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.