States not waiting on Congress to take action on climate change
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* Mark Barna

![Figure1](http://www.thenationshealth.org/http://www.thenationshealth.org/content/nathealth/52/7/1.3/F1.medium.gif)

[Figure1](http://www.thenationshealth.org/content/52/7/1.3/F1)

Solar panels are shown on the roof of a building in Los Angeles in June. California is one of the states leading the way in taking action to reduce the impacts of climate change and protect residents.

Photo by Daniel Slim, courtesy AFP/Getty Images

Even as the federal government struggles to come to agreement on how to address climate change, states are charging forward, taking steps to protect the health and lives of residents.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s June 30 decision to limit authority of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to regulate carbon emissions from existing power plants will further chip away at the federal government’s ability to fight climate change. But the authority of states to reduce emissions will not change, according the U.S. Climate Alliance, comprising 24 states and Puerto Rico, all of which have vowed to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

“We will continue moving forward with bold climate action in the states to protect the health and pocketbooks of the American people,” California, New York and Washington state governors said in a join statement after the court decision.

Polls show most Americans favor reducing greenhouse gases, and data suggest a majority of states are on board to some degree. Even Indiana, Oklahoma and Texas, which as “red” states are typically seen as less open to environmental measures, have embraced renewable energy with electricity-generating wind turbines.

“One of the reasons we’re seeing renewables deployment like we are in places where previously you might not have expected it is because they’ve just gotten so cheap,” Julie McNamara, MS, deputy policy director for climate energy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, told *The Nation’s Health*. “And they present opportunities for good jobs, local investment, cleaner air, local resilience.”

The top states with climate-friendly policies and programs are California, Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey, New York and Washington, according to an analysis released in June by RMI, a clean energy advocacy organization. Among the most important policies are investing in clean electricity infrastructure, developing carbon-free buildings and embracing electric vehicles.

“A lot of attention gets focused on what is the federal government doing to act on climate,” Kyle Clark-Sutton, MS, MPA, manager of RMI’s analysis team for the U.S. program, told *The Nation’s Health*. “But what we really need to embrace is that state governments are incredibly powerful and are really critical. State governments have really broad authority over how they generate electricity, how they build and plan our infrastructure, and how they build and maintain buildings, which has a lot of impact on emissions.”

In May, the California Air Resources Board announced its Climate Change Scoping Plan, now in its third iteration since 2008. When final, the plan will guide California’s continuing transition to a clean energy economy over the next two decades. It includes phasing out the use of fossil fuels to heat homes and buildings, and provides blueprints for walkable, bike-friendly communities with accessible public transit.

California also has rules to phase out sales of gas- and diesel-fueled cars by 2035 and trucks by 2045. Eighteen other states have similar standards to get fossil fuel-polluting vehicles off the roads.

Clark-Sutton said that states have the advantage of being able to make decisions quickly and take action. For example, states can create monetary incentives through rebates and tax credits to encourage residents to buy electric vehicles and use clean energy to power homes.

Colorado is a fast-growing state that in recent years has endured escalation of climate-driven wildfires, drought, floods and heat waves. In 2021, Colorado released its Greenhouse Gas Pollution Roadmap, which offers a strategy to reduce emissions, and recently passed S.B. 260, a $5.4-billion transportation funding bill to encourage electric vehicle use, increase biking and walking, and improve mass transit.

A notable Colorado success has been Bustang, a regional bus system started in 2015 by the Colorado Department of Transportation. Bustang offers improved customer features, such as roomy seats, internet access and an in-bus bathroom.

By 2019, the system boasted 250,000 customers, more than double from its first year of operation. The number of customers using the bus route on Interstate 70, which connects major cities on Colorado’s Front Range, was up 36% this spring compared to March 2019.

Bustang has taken 100,000 vehicles off Colorado roads, protecting the state environment from over 460,000 metric tons of carbon annually. In May, the state announced a three-year pilot expansion of the system.

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[Figure2](http://www.thenationshealth.org/content/52/7/1.3/F2)

Colorado’s Bustang service has taken 100,000 vehicles off Colorado roadways.

Photo by Allen Best, courtesy Mountain High News

## Climate justice work gains momentum

COVID-19 intensified heath inequities for people of color and those with low incomes. Climate change due to human-caused carbon emissions is doing likewise, harming the health especially of vulnerable communities near factories, power plants and busy roadways.

“When you look at any individual climate impact, there are environmental justice and inequity elements to that, where you see disproportionate burdens being distributed,” Katherine Catalano, MS, deputy director of APHA’s Center for Climate, Health and Equity, told *The Nation’s Health*.

Some states are addressing these environmental injustices. This year, the California Air Resources Board awarded three grants totaling $25 million to bring clean transportation to vulnerable neighborhoods in Los Angeles, Oakland and San Francisco. Improvements include a shuttle service, electric car-share and bike-share services, and enhancements to walking and biking infrastructure.

“This pioneering project is boosting transportation equity in communities that historically have faced higher levels of pollution,” Liane Randolph, chair of the California board, said in a news release.

Rhode Island recently passed a climate law mandating the state create a plan to reduce emissions to net zero by 2050. Written into the plan were ways to address environmental injustices and health inequities. New Jersey has become the first state to require that companies file an environmental justice analysis with their permit application to build or modify a site.

Change is also happening at the local level. In Boston in May, officials announced a new renewable energy pilot program in East Boston that will help residents install solar panels. In Los Angeles, leaders have proposed a plan that will require new residential and commercial construction to have zero emissions by 2030.

But even with state and local leadership, substantial federal involvement is needed for the U.S. to meet its carbon-reduction goals, McNamara said. As part of the 2015 Paris agreement, through which nations around the world pledged to take action to lower greenhouse gas emissions, the U.S. set a goal of reducing emissions by at least 26% by 2025. President Joe Biden has vowed that the U.S. will achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

Roadblocks continue at the federal level, however. In July, Biden’s climate agenda took a hit when an ambitious House clean energy bill offering hundreds of billions of dollars in tax incentives for solar and wind power and provisions to reduce electricity costs was scuttled. Undeterred, Biden said July 20 he would use “appropriate proclamations, executive orders and regulatory powers that the president possesses” to take action on climate change.

And although the Supreme Court decision on power plant regulations was a setback for EPA, the agency has other options. EPA has the authority to write new rules that support emissions reductions, which APHA and the American Lung Association encouraged it to do quickly.

“We need a committed effort,” McNamara told *The Nation’s Health*. “This can’t be something that’s achieved just in fits and starts. These clean-energy leadership states can help point the way, but they cannot go it alone.”

For more information on climate change, visit [www.apha.org/climate](http://www.apha.org/climate).

*   Copyright The Nation’s Health, American Public Health Association