FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 17, 2019
Richmond — In response to Governor Ralph Northam’s Executive Order announced today that included a goal to reduce Virginia’s carbon emissions and move the state’s electric portfolio to 30% renewable by 2030 and 100% carbon-free by 2050, Clean Virginia Executive Director Brennan Gilmore said,
“Governor Northam is absolutely right that Virginia should be powered by 100% clean energy by 2050, and we commend the Administration for setting the target. The climate crisis is already here, impacting Virginia’s coast faster than anywhere in the eastern United States and low-income communities across the Commonwealth at a disproportionate rate.”
“But the path to achieving a clean energy future is not through a utility monopoly whose profit model is built on expensive fossil fuel projects like the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. We need to unleash true innovation to power the Commonwealth with clean energy, which requires a rethink of how our energy market is structured. We must fix the perverse incentives of a monopoly system that rewards utilities like Dominion for unnecessary capital investment and inefficiencies in the grid, not for building the clean energy and energy efficiency resources we need. Achieving the ambitious goals in the Governor’s plan by continuing to allow Dominion Energy to set the terms of our energy future is trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.”
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Contact: Cassady Craighill, [email protected], 828-817-3328