Challenge & Opportunity
California is on a trek for a 100% clean, renewable energy portfolio by 2045. While the State has made significant progress in planning, there remain several hurdles in implementation: reliability, permitting, interconnection, procurement, and financing, to name a few. Abundant amounts of cheap, clean energy have enabled the divorce with fossil fuels, but the cost of electricity remains high, primarily due to financing constraints associated with costly investor-owned utility models as they battle wildfires and rush to upgrade the existing transmission and distribution system. Meanwhile, the burden of high utility bills and pollution from gas plants disproportionately impact communities located in California’s hottest regions, which includes communities of color and/or low-income. Energy and climate activists have long pushed for the shutdown of costly, polluting gas generation, and despite significant progress, the need to fight persists.