The OurEnergyLibrary aggregates and indexes publicly available fact sheets, journal articles, reports, studies, and other publications on U.S. energy topics. It is updated every week to include the most recent energy resources from academia, government, industry, non-profits, think tanks, and trade associations. Suggest a resource by emailing us at info@ourenergypolicy.org.
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Clean energy can be a powerful tool in combatting environmental injustices, and SEIA and its allies are pushing for smart policies that equitably grow the clean energy economy. This fact sheet covers the key provisions in the Build Back Better Act that can help to accelerate a just transition to a clean economy, provide economic wellbeing for frontline communities, and deliver a healthy and prosperous future.
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View Full ResourceSolar energy, including household and community based solar photovoltaic panels, is the fastest growing source of low-carbon electricity worldwide, and it could become the single largest source of renewable energy by midcentury. But what negative equity and justice issues may be associated with its adoption? What risks are being accelerated as solar energy grows exponentially in its deployment? In this study, we rely on a mixed methods research design involving household solar interviews, site visits, and a
literature review to investigate four types of inequities associated with household solar adoption. We utilize a novel framework looking at demographic inequities (between …
From the mid-1980s through 2010, coal was a leading source of U.S. energy, providing up to half of the country’s annual electricity. Coal-fired electric power production peaked around 2007, when coal-fired electricity generating capacity in the U.S. totaled 313 gigawatts (GW) across 1,470 generators. A decade later, about 70 GW of this capacity was retired. Many of these retirements were concentrated in Appalachia, the Southeast, the Illinois Basin, and a few in the Midwest and the Four Corners region (northeast Arizona, northwest New Mexico, eastern Utah, and western Colorado). Of the 237 U.S. coal-fired power plants that are still operational, …
View Full ResourceThe Biden-Harris administration recognizes the historic opportunity and pressing need to address long-standing inequities that people of color continue to face from systemic racism, economic barriers, and environmental health injustices. Climate change is here and threatens to exacerbate inequalities for people of color and low-income households. These are the same populations and communities that for decades have been disproportionately and systematically harmed by pollution.
The objective of this report is to help the Biden-Harris team and other federal decision-makers improve upon state approaches to maximize the benefits of Justice40 effectively and equitably. To do so, …
View Full ResourceDecarbonization creates enormous opportunities to advance the vital goals of clean air and environmental justice while combating climate change. But these co-benefits are not automatic: to attain them, climate policy must be designed with these goals explicitly in mind. Clean air and environmental justice criteria could be included, for example, in the formulation of Clean Energy Standards (CES) to mandate that electricity companies not only increase the share of clean and renewable power but also meet standards for curbing hazardous air pollution and its disproportionate impacts on low-income communities and people of color.
This report analyzes alternative decarbonization pathways in …
View Full ResourceIn this report:
– We outline how Congress can use a federal clean energy standard to put the U.S. on a path to 100% clean electricity by 2035.
– We show how a CES can be designed to rapidly decarbonize the power sector and center equity, good jobs, and community benefits while doing so.
– We also outline a number of investments and justice-centered policies that will be required to achieve this rapid 100% clean power goal.
– And we argue that this crucial policy commitment made by Democratic leaders can and must overcome any potential legislative barriers. This includes …
View Full ResourceThis paper reviews the prevailing three-tenet framework of energy justice which has shaped the current discourse based on the three dimensions—distributional, procedural, and recognition justice.…
View Full ResourcePoverty, climate change and energy security demand awareness about the interlinkages between energy systems and social justice. Amidst these challenges, energy justice has emerged to conceptualize a world where all individuals, across all areas, have safe, affordable and sustainable energy that is, essentially, socially just. Simultaneously, new social and technological solutions to energy problems continually evolve, and interest in the concept of sociotechnical transitions has grown. However, an element often missing from such transitions frameworks is explicit engagement with energy justice frameworks. Despite the development of an embryonic set of literature around these themes, an obvious research gap has emerged: …
View Full ResourceThis paper introduces the concept of spatializing energy justice and inequality to understandings of energy poverty and vulnerability.…
View Full ResourceRead this resource for a summary of Our Energy Policy’s event on Working Together for an Inclusive Energy Transformation from November 6th, 2023, discussing a just clean energy transition.…
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