Pages tagged "climate"
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How Decades of Racist Housing Policy Left Neighborhoods Sweltering
RICHMOND, VA -- "In the 20th century, local and federal officials, usually white, enacted policies that reinforced racial segregation in cities and diverted investment away from minority neighborhoods in ways that created large disparities in the urban heat environment.
The consequences are being felt today.
...In the 1930s, the federal government created maps of hundreds of cities, rating the riskiness of different neighborhoods for real estate investment by grading them 'best,' 'still desirable,' 'declining' or “hazardous.” Race played a defining role: Black and immigrant neighborhoods were typically rated 'hazardous' and outlined in red, denoting a perilous place to lend money. For decades, people in redlined areas were denied access to federally backed mortgages and other credit, fueling a cycle of disinvestment."
-- Brad Plumer and Nadja Popovich, New York Times
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How a utility undermined climate policy — then got caught
"The climate consequences can be serious.
In Ohio, FirstEnergy Solutions made the decision to keep open W.H. Sammis, the second-largest coal plant in the state, after the bailout law passed.
Sammis emitted 12.3 million tons of CO2 in 2013, according to EPA data. But the plant has run less and less in recent years. It ran only 20% in 2019, down from 61% in 2014.
Last year, it reported CO2 emissions of 4.6 million tons, or what 900,000 cars emit annually.
The result is a one-two punch to climate and consumers, forcing them to pay for polluting plants that are no longer economic, said Leah Stokes, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who has written extensively about Ohio's bailout law. She said FirstEnergy represents one of the most egregious cases of utility corruption, but is part of a larger pattern of power companies' approach to climate policy."
-- Benjamin Storrow, E&E News
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