Click Here to See the Map of Sierra Club Public Comment Submissions.<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n The Draft State Energy Plan unlawfully weakens existing emission-reduction commitments, walks back important plans to decarbonize New York\u2019s energy sector, and does too little to onboard clean energy. Inaction and continued reliance on expensive gas to power homes and buildings could cost New Yorkers on their energy bills. Already,\u00a01.3 million New Yorkers<\/a>\u00a0are two or more months behind on their energy bills, as\u00a0local utilities report record profits<\/a>. In addition to increased utility bills, a State Energy Plan that prioritizes fossil fuel will threaten public health and further exacerbate extreme weather, costing New York in medical bills and lost work days, and increasing the costs of climate adaptation.<\/p>\n Ultimately, the completed State Energy Plan will provide broad policy directions that guide New York\u2019s energy decisions. The Plan is meant to be updated triennially, however New York is undertaking its first update to the Plan in a decade. This is the first Plan revision since the state enacted the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) in 2020.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the six years since New York enacted the CLCPA, the urgency of the climate crisis has only grown, along with the need for strong leadership from vanguard states like New York,\u201d said\u00a0Josh Berman, Sierra Club Senior Attorney.\u00a0\u201cSierra Club will not stand by while New York turns its back on the requirements of the CLCPA. New York leaders must fulfill their obligations and use the final State Energy Plan to put New York back on track to achieve mandated emissions reductions.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe Draft State Energy Plan is missing something critical, a way to fund the clean energy transition that doesn\u2019t fall on New York\u2019s working families,\u201d said\u00a0Allyson Samuell, Sierra Club Senior Campaign Representative in New York. \u201cThankfully, developing a Cap and Invest program would lower New Yorkers\u2019 electricity bills and directly support the transition to cleaner, renewable energy. This holiday season, we are asking Governor Hochul: release the Cap and Invest regulations.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs it stands, the Draft State Energy Plan would be a real gut-punch to New York\u2019s climate progress,\u201d said\u00a0Gabe Recchio, Sierra Club\u2019s Clean Heat Organizer in New York.\u00a0\u201cWe are calling on Governor Hochul to use this State Energy Plan to make up for federal policies that favor polluting fossil fuels, but right now, the Draft Plan fails to meet the political moment or address New Yorkers\u2019 health and affordability needs.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe current Draft Energy Plan does not do enough to connect clean, renewable energy to New York\u2019s power grid,\u201d said\u00a0Jason Dragseth, Sierra Club Volunteer. \u201cNew York must commit to onboarding clean, homegrown, affordable energy, like offshore wind. South Fork Wind, our state\u2019s first offshore wind farm, just celebrated its first year of operation and\u00a0the data\u00a0<\/a>coming in from it is outstanding. New York\u2019s Energy Plan must remain committed to developing 9GW of offshore wind.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image_20251209_123348_863.jpeg.webp\")
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK \u2014 Yesterday, the Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter delivered over 1,000 State Energy Plan comments submitted by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[426,9,11,10,49,51,50,35328],"class_list":["post-68074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-kathy-hochul","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-sierra-club"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68074","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=68074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}