Proposals to reverse or delay provisions of the state’s landmark climate law are some of the main reasons behind the late state budget. But Syracuse-area state lawmakers and environmental advocates warn undermining the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act could end up costing New Yorkers even more. Senator Rachel May said fossil fuels are not a stable long-term strategy.
“The more we depend on fossil fuels, the more vulnerable we are to dictators in the Middle East, in Russia," she said. "The more we lean into green energy, especially wind and solar, energy we're producing here in our state, the less vulnerable we are to those kinds of price fluctuations.”
She pointed to peaks in demand for natural gas during a colder winter that drives up costs for consumers.
Assemblymember Al Stirpe said throwing more money at fossil fuels derails green energy investments.
“If you're going to have to spend $150 billion redoing the gas infrastructure, you’re not going to have that money to go ahead and do the transition to electrification," he said.
“And it locks New York into decades-long timelines where it becomes even more expensive to transition to renewables," said Vanessa Fajans-Turner, executive director of Environmental Advocates of New York.
She and others said it takes much longer to build a natural gas power plant rather than building green energy sources to address the state’s looming energy crisis.
