Update: Victory!

The 2022 version of the “Climate Solutions Now Act” passed on March 31, 2022, and became law shortly after without Governor Hogan’s signature. The policy makes an excellent commitment to cut statewide greenhouse gas emissions 60% below 2006 levels by 2031 and reach net-zero emissions by 2045. Among other things, it also requires large buildings (35,000 square feet or larger) to reduce their emissions by 20% by 2030, the electrification of the state passenger and light-duty fleet, and investments in overburdened communities by adding climate-focused positions in the Maryland Chesapeake Conservation Corp and targeting climate investments in low-to-moderate income communities.

But the work isn’t over. The General Assembly also ignored a bipartisan recommendation from the prestigious Maryland Commission on Climate Change to require electric hot water and space heating systems in all new buildings starting in 2023. We’ll keep working to improve climate policies in Maryland.

Read more here.

In Maryland, climate change is no longer some far-away problem. It’s making life harder right now. But we are just beginning to feel the true impact of fossil fuel pollution and the global warming it continues to unleash.

But Maryland’s current climate plan, put forth by Governor Hogan and his administration, fails to match the urgency of the crisis. We need a new climate plan. It starts by passing the Climate Solutions Act of 2020.

LEARN MORE AND TAKE ACTION AT CCAN ACTION FUND

It’s “The Climate Decade”: Climate Change Is Here. Now We Have To Act.

Climate change is already making life harder in Maryland:

As the state with the second-most tidal shore communities at risk of flooding, we’re already starting to lose islands (like Fox Island) in the Chesapeake Bay due to sea level rise. Our flooding risk extends far beyond our waterfront areas, as we tragically experienced during two “thousand-year floods” in Ellicott City within 22 months. Rising temperatures have already damaged the health of the Chesapeake Bay, weakening the tourism and seafood industries that support many Maryland livelihoods. Maryland has the fourth most premature deaths in the nation caused by dirty energy-created air pollution.

But it will only get worse:

The 2020’s are projected to bring more severe storms, more dangerous flooding, and more extreme heat. Between 1981 and 2010, Maryland averaged about six days above 95 degrees per year. If we continue on our current path of greenhouse gas emissions, we will have 20 days above 95 degrees per year–more than triple that of before–by the end of the decade. Extreme heat is linked with severe negative consequences, such as decreased economic activity, increased violent crime, and worse educational outcomes.

And we’re running out of time:

This decade is also our last window of time before the climate crisis kicks into high gear. According to the world’s leading climate scientists, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), we have to cut global greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 to prevent the worst climate devastation. For Maryland, one of the wealthiest states in one of the wealthiest nations, that means we need to do even more: reduce our emissions by 60 percent by 2030. Between worsening consequences and the closing window for action, it’s clear that the 2020’s will be The Climate Decade. In other words, we have less than 900 days of the Maryland General Assembly left to act. Each one needs to count.

Under the Hogan Administration, Maryland Trails Other States on Pollution Reduction

In 2009, Maryland became one of the first states to address climate change when it passed the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Act (GGRA), requiring a 25 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. We then expanded that law in 2016, requiring a 40 percent reduction by 2030.

However, other states have passed more ambitious reduction targets and climate scientists have since warned that we need to do more than previously understood. The IPCC issued a crystal clear message in 2018 that states like Maryland need to cut our emissions by 60 percent by 2030 and reach net zero emissions by 2045.

And even our weak emissions goals likely won’t be met. According to the Center for Climate Strategies, an independent nonprofit that helps states and nations develop climate action plans, Maryland “is unlikely to meet state mandated emissions reductions targets in 2030 or long term decarbonization pathways needs through 2040 and 2050” due to methodological errors in the Hogan Administration’s draft climate plan.

Hogan’s current plan has the following flaws:

It relies heavily on fracked gas as an energy source and new fracked-gas infrastructure. Fracked gas leaks at every stage in extraction and piping, emitting methane, which is 86 times worse than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas over a 20 year period;
It makes no plan to phase out coal as an electricity source, even as the Hogan Administration’s draft climate plan includes data that shows electricity generated from coal continuing through 2040.
It is especially flawed when it comes to reducing greenhouse gas emissions reductions in the transportation sector, due to unrealistic assumptions on widespread electric vehicle adoption, dubious claims that highway widening will result in fewer emissions, and a lack of proposed strategies for reducing car travel demand.

WATCH THE VIDEO ABOUT THE FLAWS IN HOGAN’S PLAN:

Meanwhile, many other states have much more ambitious emissions reduction targets and are moving forward with real plans to meet those goals. Both California and New York have set 2045 and 2050 respectively as deadlines by which their entire state economies will reach net zero emissions. Those two states also join six others in setting more ambitious medium-range emissions reduction targets. For example, North Carolina plans a 40 percent reduction in 2025 (five years before Maryland), and Colorado (50 percent by 2030), Maine (51 percent by 2030), and Vermont (58 percent by 2028) each plan to far exceed Maryland’s outdated 2030 target.

To stay a climate leader, our law needs an update to match new science. Maryland, like most of the world, has tough work ahead in the next decade when it comes to slowing climate change.

The 2020’s will be The Climate Decade. In other words, we have less than 900 days of the Maryland General Assembly left to act. Each one needs to count.

The Solution: The Climate Solutions Act of 2020

We need to move to 100 percent clean and renewable energy, greatly expand public transit and accelerate the conversion to electric vehicles, retrofit existing buildings and construct “zero emissions” new buildings, and sequester carbon pollution in forestry and healthy soils. We will need to do so in a way that protects workers and invests in communities that are on the frontlines of the climate crisis or have historically seen racial discrimination.

We can take the first step in that work by strengthening our state climate plan in 2020. The Climate Solutions Act will align our emissions reduction targets with the world’s leading science and reposition Maryland as a climate leader. It will require fixes to our state’s flawed climate plan and take some immediate climate actions, from planting millions of new trees to increasing energy efficiency. And it will lay the groundwork for an equitable transition to a new, clean economy.

Learn more and take action with CCAN Action Fund