The Senate today approved legislation sponsored by Senate Environment and Agriculture Chairwoman Dawn Euer to update Rhode Island’s climate-emission reduction goals and to make them enforceable.
The 2021 Act on Climate (2021-S 0078A) would make the state’s climate goals outlined in the Resilient Rhode Island Act of 2014 more ambitious and updated with current science. Under the bill, the state would develop a plan to reduce all climate emissions from transportation, buildings and heating, and electricity used economywide in the state to 10 percent below 1990 levels this year, 45 percent below 1990 levels by 2030, 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2040 and net-zero by 2050.
The sponsor says the climate crisis poses too grave a threat to the earth and to Rhode Island in particular to treat climate emissions reduction as an aspiration rather than an obligation.
