After a landmark vote by its state Assembly, California is poised to join Hawaii and become the second state committed to generating 100 percent of its electricity from renewable and zero-carbon sources. If the state Senate votes in favor of the current version of Senate Bill 100, which has only minor changes to a bill the Senate already passed, and then Gov. Jerry Brown signs it, California will commit to a clear target of 100 percent clean electricity by 2045.
Today, Kroger Co. announced its plan to phase out single-use plastic bags and transition to reusable bags across its 15 brands of grocery stores by 2025, starting with Seattle-based QFC in 2019.
Atlanta, GA -- Today, the Trump administration announced new vehicle emission guidelines which roll back the existing Clean Car Standards. This regressive move will get rid of our nation’s best climate change mitigation program, which is cutting future carbon emissions more effectively than any other current federal policy. Preliminary calculations indicate this move could increase global warming emissions by 2.2. billion metric tons. It also threatens to worsen Georgia’s air quality—a report put out by Environment Georgia in June 2018 found that Atlanta had 118 dirty air days in 2016. This action betrays the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA)’s stated mission of protecting human health and the environment.
[Atlanta, GA] –According to a new report by Environment Georgia Research & Policy Center air pollution remains a threat to public health. 5.8 million people in the Atlanta area experienced 118 days of degraded air quality in 2016, increasing the risk of premature death, asthma attacks and other adverse health impacts.
These troubling findings come at a time when the Trump administration prepares to weaken the federal clean car standards, a critical program to cut global warming emissions and increase fuel efficiency. And just this week, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt announced the agency will review the federal ozone standard -- a standard he sued to stop when he was Oklahoma’s attorney general.
Environment Georgia Research and Policy Center is part of The Public Interest Network, which operates and supports organizations committed to a shared vision of a better world and a strategic approach to social change.
