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Lawmakers weigh bills to bar woody biomass from municipal standards and alternative energy subsidies
Summary
Legislators, municipal officials and public health advocates urged the committee to remove woody biomass from municipal lighting plant greenhouse gas standards and from the Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard, citing air pollution, public health and climate concerns; proponents said a looming statutory effective date makes action urgent.
Legislators, municipal officials, environmental groups and public health advocates urged the Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities and Energy to pass bills that would prevent woody biomass from qualifying as a clean energy source for municipal lighting plants and from receiving incentives under the Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard (APS).
"This is not an abstract policy issue. This is about air our children breathe, the future of our climate, and the integrity of our energy goals," Senator Gomez said when he introduced the measures (S.2288 and S.2287 and their House counterparts). Witnesses told the committee that allowing woody biomass to count toward municipal greenhouse gas standards or to receive APS credits would effectively subsidize facilities that produce significant fine-particulate and greenhouse-gas emissions.
Testimony described a specific urgency: language in the Next-Generation Climate Roadmap creates municipal lighting plant (MLP) greenhouse-gas…
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