On one of the first chilly nights of fall, union members, Democratic Socialists, scientists, and teachers filed into the pews of a Brooklyn church for what they called the \u201cPeople\u2019s Hearing for Public Renewables.\u201d Zohran Mamdani \u2014 fresh off winning his Democratic primary, and expected to become the next mayor of New York City \u2014 wasn\u2019t there, but he loomed over the festivities Many in the crowd believed they were on the verge of finally gaining an ally with the power to help achieve their longstanding goal: A New York almost entirely powered by publicly owned and regulated renewable energy.<\/p>\n
New York\u2019s public-renewables campaign \u201cwas instrumental in getting Zohran elected,\u201d state Assemblymember Marcela Mitaynes said of Mamdani\u2019s primary win that night. They want an expanded public power system, utilities and renewable generation owned and regulated by community stakeholders, not corporations. That campaign, which began in earnest four years ago, was driven by a small group of progressive and socialist legislators in Albany: among them, Zohran Mamdani, who was elected to the Assembly in 2020. He has since rallied that same base \u2013 experienced canvassers, people used to hiking up six-floor walk-ups and texting their friends to rally for a policy or for a candidate \u2013 for his election as mayor.<\/p>\n
Now, with Mamdani about to take office, the question is whether he and the state can deliver on those hopes. The mayor\u2019s office doesn\u2019t lead public power projects. That job belongs to the New York Power Authority, a state agency established in 1931 as an early experiment in publicly owned power generation and a model for more widely known projects like the Tennessee Valley Authority. Throughout the 20th century, the agency built transmission infrastructure, backed massive hydropower projects,\u00a0 and led energy efficiency initiatives in state buildings.<\/p>\n
In more recent years, proponents of publicly-owned green energy sometimes saw the New York Power Authority as less of an ally<\/a> and more of a stumbling block<\/a>. But in 2023, the Legislature passed the Build Public Renewables Act<\/a>, or BPRA, which requires the New York Power Authority to fast-track and finance clean energy projects \u2013 enough of them, the law said, to power 70 percent of the state by 2030.\u00a0Now, the question is if and when that law will be enforced.<\/p>\n In July, the authority released a plan to build 7 gigawatts of solar and wind with battery storage. Critics of that plan \u2013 many of whom helped write and pass the BPRA in the first place \u2014 say that isn\u2019t enough electricity to meet statewide energy needs, or to comply with law\u2019s 2030 deadline. In 2023, the state comptroller reported the ambitious 70 percent goal would require the state to at least triple its renewables capacity \u2013 at that point, only about 25 percent of New York\u2019s energy came from renewables, largely hydroelectric power. That number hasn\u2019t budged much \u2013 and last year, a state agency estimated<\/a> that the authority would need another three years to meet the 2030 deadline.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, with a powerful ally about to take office, activists like Johanna Bozuwa, executive director of the Climate and Communities Institute, think now is a \u201ckey moment\u201d to push the power authority forward NYPA. With federal tax credits for clean power set to expire in 2027, \u201cthey have a real incentive, right now, to move as quickly as they can. If there was ever a moment for them to mobilize as quickly as possible, this is the one to do it.\u201d So, on that brisk September night in Brooklyn, public power activists wanted to use the moment of Mamdani\u2019s win to tell the New York Power Authority to go even further: instead of a 7 gigawatt plan, they wanted 15.<\/p>\n Mamdani won\u2019t have a direct hand in how the power authority executes the Build Public Renewables Act, but as mayor of the largest city in the nation, he can shape where and how New York City supports the transition. Much of what he can do resides on the consumer end: not just helping build more public power, but limiting the city\u2019s consumption of it. His administration could require rooftop-solar installations on municipal buildings, align city permitting and zoning with state clean energy priorities, and use his Green Schools<\/a> plan to advance the agenda. Mamdani can also control the enforcement of Local Law 97 \u2013 a city mandate that buildings larger than 25,0000 square feet nearly halve their emissions by 2030.\u00a0For activists, that makes City Hall a crucial partner.<\/p>\n \u201cI often call schools the charismatic megafauna of building decarbonization,\u201d Bozuwa said: they\u2019re places where students, parents, and teachers interact, and where other members of the community might go to vote, attend a town hall, or otherwise participate in the world beyond their home and their job. \u201cI really see this as a key opportunity for the incoming administration to showcase the power of collaboration with an entity like NYPA, to leverage its power and relationships to decarbonize these schools.\u201d The Connecticut Green Bank already has a similar program, Bozuwa said. \u201cSo, it\u2019s a model that exists already \u2014 putting public renewables on top of public schools.\u201d And in New York, similar programs already exist on a smaller scale: the New York Power Authority is working with a city agency to place solar panels on 47 schools.<\/p>\n The Authority\u2019s board will vote on their next strategic plan December 9th. \u201cThe plan will be updated regularly, and it is anticipated that projects will continually be added or fall out during the project development process,\u201d NYPA spokesperson Susan Craig said.<\/p>\n But the current funding environment for clean-power projects is hostile. Some experts believe the current seven-gigawatt plan is too ambitious, and that the power authority simply \u201ccan\u2019t achieve those types of objectives,\u201d as one former member of the state\u2019s Climate Action Council told Inside Climate News<\/a>. Others are concerned that proposing too much too fast might jeopardize the agency\u2019s bond rating<\/a>, leaving it less able to finance future projects.<\/p>\n And only three days after Mamdani\u2019s election, Governor Kathy Hochul granted a thrice-rejected permit for the Northeast Supply Enhancement, a proposed fracked gas pipeline<\/a> that would add to a 10,000-mile network stretching from Texas to New York, clearing the path for the state to rely even more on fossil fuels than it has in previous years.<\/p>\n Although climate was a key issue for Mamdani during his five years in the Assembly, he said little about it on the campaign trail<\/a>. Still, his election has raised expectations among climate advocates \u2014 and questions about how much he can actually change. New York City remains far more dependent on fossil fuels than the rest of the state, largely because transmission bottlenecks prevent the renewable power generated update from coming in, and the city has not met its own clean energy goals to transition to 100% clean energy by 2040. \u201cIt\u2019s like a tale of two grids,\u201d Andrea Johnson, a researcher with the Public Power New York Coalition, said. But a state-local partnership to deliver more clean power, cut consumption of that power, and maybe even lower bills doesn\u2019t seem entirely unlikely.<\/p>\n This wouldn\u2019t be the first time New York City has partnered with a state agency to achieve climate goals. This year alone, the power authority has worked with New York Public Schools to install energy-efficient lighting throughout the school system \u2013 lighting the agency said<\/a> will eventually save the city about $10 million annually. It has joined with the city\u2019s housing authority to replace gas stoves in 10,000 apartments with energy-efficient induction models, as they announced November 13th<\/a>. And these collaborations go back decades: in the 1990s, for example, an energy-efficient-refrigerator program that began with power authority funding in New York City public housing ended up paving the way for development of a refrigerator design<\/a> that used 30 percent less energy than the Department of Energy\u2019s standard at the time. The city could look to a similar model to purchase subsidized heat pumps<\/a> for buildings struggling to comply with emissions standards \u2013 but in order to lower electricity bills across the board, Mamdani\u2019s administration will need to solve the generation end of the puzzle, too.\u00a0So far, NYPA has signed on to build one major solar array<\/a> within New York City limits: a ten-megawatt cluster of panels at a wastewater treatment facility.<\/p>\n When Mamdani\u2019s first mayoral budget<\/a> proposal comes out at the beginning of February, we may see the first signs of how this new administration plans to build on those efforts. With a city budget shortfall<\/a> of $5 to $8 billion, threats from President Donald Trump to cut off billions in federal aid to New York City and the state, and lawmakers in Albany anxious about overspending. But selling climate policy as affordability policy is a strategy that\u2019s recently paid big dividends.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can\u2019t disaggregate climate from cost of living,\u201d Bozuwa said. \u201cThe Mamdani administration really has the opportunity to show what a new form of climate politics looks like, one that actually brings climate and cost of living together.\u201d<\/p>\n This story was originally published by Grist<\/a> with the headline Can Mamdani supercharge New York\u2019s clean energy revolution?<\/a> on Nov 19, 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On one of the first chilly nights of fall, union members, Democratic Socialists, scientists, and teachers filed into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44650,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4762,19475,9,24,11,10,25621,25622,2157,82],"class_list":["post-44649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-energy","tag-green-energy","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-power-authority","tag-public-power","tag-renewable-energy","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44649\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}