Today is the summer solstice, the day of the year with the most sunshine, and Indiana conservationists said they have a plan to make the best use of solar energy.

In a new report, called Mining the Sun, The Nature Conservancy says the quickest way for the state to gain energy independence is to utilize unused sites -- such as abandoned mines, brownfields or dumpsites -- to develop solar and wind farms.

Sean Mobley, senior policy associate for The Nature Conservancy-Indiana, said there is less resistance to using sites not being used in other ways.

"If you have acres that are abandoned mines or brown fields, they don't really serve a purpose in the community or economically anymore," Mobley pointed out. "We see clean energy as a way to transition those back to productive acres."

Mobley noted clean energy is a way to transition land back to productive acres. In a Nature Conservancy survey, 66% of Hoosiers favor solar energy production, and 69% support adding state incentives to facilitate solar and wind development on brownfields and mine lands.

Mobley emphasized solar capacity tripled across the state from 2021 to 2022, and Indiana ranks eighth in the nation for projected solar energy growth by 2025. He added the state's Department of Natural Resources currently has $385 million in federal grants available to reclaim abandoned mine lands.

"There are a little over 150,000 acres of mine lands, primarily in southwest Indiana, that would be suitable for solar energy development," Mobley stressed. "Again, bringing back economic and conservation value back to those acres."

The Mining the Sun report outlines steps to develop policies to generate new revenue streams for landowners and create jobs in construction and maintenance.

"I think the first step is to develop some bill language for the next legislative session that would direct the Indiana Department of Natural Resources to update the Indiana state reclamation plan for the abandoned Mine Lands program," Mobley urged.


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June is World Ocean Month and groups fighting climate change are asking President Joe Biden to act to clean up emissions and pollution from the shipping industry.

Advocates have been meeting with White House officials since last fall, making the case for an executive order to decarbonize maritime shipping, which largely runs on what they describe as dirty diesel fuel.

Teresa Bui, climate policy director for the nonprofit Pacific Environment, said the administration should act now.

"We're asking President Biden to use the Clean Air Act authority to help establish goal-based fuel standards for ships to reduce shipping emission by 100% by 2040," Bui explained.

Opponents in the shipping industry said electrifying ships would carry a big price tag and raise the cost of goods. Advocates countered the price increases would be minimal compared to the benefits of cleaner air. Groups are also asking the feds to monitor the fuels on ships coming to U.S. ports to get better pollution data. And they want to mandate ports to bring greenhouse gas emissions and pollution to zero by 2030.

Bui noted a 2019 community health study showed people in communities near the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles experience up to eight years lower life expectancy than the Los Angeles County average.

"Black Long Beach residents are hospitalized with asthma at least eight times the rate, and Latinx residents at twice the rate of white Long Beach residents," Bui pointed out.

She added they also want the Biden administration to pursue more "green" shipping corridors and phase out the use of sulfur scrubber ships in U.S. waters. They are used to remove sulfur from ship exhaust but release contaminants into the water.

Big oil is dropping the ball when it comes to meeting the companies' public pledges to help avert catastrophic climate change, according to a new analysis of the eight biggest U.S. and European producers.

U.S.-based corporations Chevron, ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil each ranked "grossly insufficient" on all the report's criteria.

David Tong, global industry campaign manager for the advocacy group Oil Change International and the report's co-author, said just 5% of the sector's capital investments are in clean energy. Over 90% is going into fossil fuels.

"None of them come anywhere close to aligning with what's needed to confront the climate crisis," Tong contended. "Instead of cutting production, they almost all aim to increase production this critical decade."

Several oil companies mentioned in the report said it misrepresented their climate plans. The oil and gas industry has argued finding new places to drill is necessary to meet demand during a transition to clean energy, especially in hard to electrify industries like concrete production and air travel.

Leading global scientists say fossil fuel pollution must peak before 2025, then fall by 43% by 2030, and reach net-zero by 2050 to prevent the worst impacts of a changing climate. Tong pointed out the science shows there is no pathway to meet the climate targets by expanding oil and gas production.

"If companies stopped approving new fields, what would be left in their existing producing fields would be enough to meet the world's energy demand," Tong argued.

Because oil and gas corporations are not likely to voluntarily transition their business model, Tong believes governments will need to intervene. The marketplace could also play a role. Tong pointed to new global data showing, for the first time, $2 are being invested in clean energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels.

"The transition is underway," Tong emphasized. "Governments need to resist the pressure from the industry that has done the most to cause the climate crisis, and accelerate the change. It's happening, it's just not happening fast enough."


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Connecticut environmental advocates want the General Assembly to address climate action in this week's special session, since lawmakers failed to act on several climate bills.

The state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection's latest Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory reported emissions increased from 2020 to 2022.

Lori Brown, executive director of the Connecticut League of Conservation Voters, said recent high temperatures are a sign of what is to come if the state delays climate action further.

"We're not making progress," Brown asserted. "We're slipping backwards, and it's having real health impacts. I mean, look at today. I can almost guarantee you that, you know, there's going to be a lot of asthma attacks and heat stroke, and things that are really affecting their health first."

Brown and others are focused on House Bill 5004. It updates Connecticut's 16-year-old climate goals and aligns gas system planning with mandates to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It also sets heat-pump targets to decarbonize buildings.

Republican filibusters and general uncertainty are blamed for the bill's failure despite overwhelming support. The special session is June 26-27.

Beyond this year's shortened legislative session, misinformation is a major reason climate action has stalled.

Tom Swan, executive director of the Connecticut Citizen Action Group, noted it came up when the state tried passing new "clean car" standards. He said long term impacts from inaction on climate change can harm the state.

"One, we will fall behind economically, in terms of what the future economy will look like," Swan pointed out. "And two, we enable the climate-denying states to continue to act in a really harmful way."

A Yale Program on Climate Change Communication poll showed a majority of voters nationwide favor climate legislation at the state and federal level, and only 15% of people polled said they think the U.S. government is responding well to the climate crisis.


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