Energy and Climate

By Laura Wells

California has a significant role to play in addressing the global climate crisis.

• Cleaner, Sustainable, Local Energy
• Local Community Power
• Fairness & Equal Opportunity

Dirty fossil fuel sources of energy release CO2 emissions, which are the cause of the global climate crisis. Coal is worst of the fossil fuels. California imports over 20% of its electricity from out-of-state coal-fired plants. About another 20% of our total electricity is generated from nuclear power, and most of the rest is generated from natural gas, a finite fossil fuel. California is a big greenhouse gas emitter. The state contributes about 1.5% of the total global emission of greenhouse gases. For this reason, California has a significant role to play in addressing the global climate crisis. What We Propose Cleaner, Sustainable, Local Energy

The remedy to the climate crisis is to reduce emissions through conservation and efficiency, coupled with a rapid, phased transition to cleaner sustainable local energy sources. As appropriate technologies are accelerated through Federal and State incentives, an increasingly experienced "Green Workforce" will take its place in the new California economy and lay the foundations for future phases. Federal and State strategies, providing financial capacity and incentives through tax rebates and Green Home investment credits, will need to be coordinated to enable local solutions through accelerated weatherization, solarization and retrofitting of existing homes and businesses, using current technological solutions initially, and staging future deployments as technological advances enable new efficiencies and economies of local scale.

The most affordable and job-creating road toward energy savings is conservation through weatherization of our buildings and deployment of energy efficient technologies such as LED lighting and tank-less water heaters. Renewable energy technologies such as solar photovoltaic and wind power generation are here now and are rapidly expanding. Geothermal, marine-based renewable energy and other emerging renewable technologies are proven and hold great promise. We already have enough of the first-phase solutions to start immediately.

As Governor, Laura Wells would implement them.

Read the full text of Laura's Energy and Climate policy at: http://www.laurawells.org/platform/12-energy-and-climate.html

Read Laura's other platform planks at: http://www.laurawells.org/platform.html