New York needs to commit to 100% clean, renewable energy by 2030. Enact a Green New Deal. Halt new Fossil Fuels.
Climate change poses an existential threat to humanity, not only from global warming and extreme weather but from its role in the sixth mass extinction of species in the planet’s history. Green energy would help reduce the climate crisis and is a path to full employment and lower energy prices.
GELF worked with 350NYC and the Divest NY campaign to convince both the NYC and State pension funds to divest from fossil fuels, a process which NYC has completed. While NYS Comptroller Tom DiNapoli, after a decade-long campaign, agreed to divest in exchange for dropping legislation to require him to do so, he reversed his position on large gas and oil companies two years ago, claiming they were now committed to climate action. GELF supports the ongoing campaign to divest the NYS Teacher’s Retirement System from fossil fuel. (more below)
Putting Out the Planetary Fire: An Introduction to Climate Change and Advocacy
GELF has published an introductory book to the science and politics of climate change. It is available on our website through the above pull- down menu or at this link (which includes the index and link to each chapter). (See praise from Bill McKibben, Dr. Mark Jacobson, Elizabeth Kolbert, Ralph Nader, Dr. Alice Green, Dr. Jill Stein, Judith Enck, and others). A paperback version can be purchased here through Amazon Books. There is also the Putting Out the Planetary Fire podcast.
The first part of the book provides a brief overview of the key aspects of climate change. This includes examining issues related to developing solar and wind power, energy conservation and efficiency, carbon pricing, timelines for transition, buildings, transportation, agriculture, environmental justice, climate reparations, military, and a Green New Deal. It examines the role of fossil fuels, including both the use of and the industry’s political and economic power. It addresses what many call false climate solutions, such as carbon capture and sequestration, bioenergy, and blue hydrogen.
The second part addresses the theory and practice of social change. It outlines the various strategies and techniques that can be used to persuade governments and other decision makers to take the rapid action needed to prevent climate chaos. It examines the role of the legislature, executive branches, courts, and international bodies (e.g., IPCC, COP) in determining climate action. It provides an introduction to lobbying, public education, the role of the media, protest, and direct action / civil disobedience.
Strengthen, Don’t Weaken, NY’s Climate Law
While GELF drafted much stronger climate legislation than what became the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA), it opposes the efforts by Governor Hochul to weaken the state’s climate law. A state Supreme Court judge in 2025 determined that Hochul had violated the CLCPA by failing to meet the deadline to issue regulations on how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, The Governor’s weak implementation of the law means that the state is years behind in meeting the required goals, such as getting 70% of the state’s electricity from renewble energy by 2030 and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030. The Governor’s response has been to push to weaken the law rather than speeding up the state’s efforts.
GELF has been a long time advocate of public power, combining public ownership of the energy system (including the distribution and transmission grid) with democratic control. Here are the comments it submitted to the NY Power Authority strategic plan. It has faulted Gov. Hochul for resisting implementation of the Build Public Renewables Act.
NYS Legislature Fails to take action on climate
Compounding the problems with Gov. Hochus been the weakness of the state legislature in taking action on climate, instead deferring to the executive branch. At best, one or two pieces of climate legislation pass annually, often with amendments to weaken it. Many groups campaigned for years for the NY Heat Act, to align agency action with the CLCPA and to cap utility bills for low and moderate income customers at 6% of their income. When the “bill” finally passed, it only included ending the practice of having utility companies provide a free hookup to gas pipelines if the customer was when 100 feet of an existing line, which added hundreds of millions of dollars annually to the rate basis – and then Hochul delayed implementation for a year. She also agreed to suspend the January 1, 2026 deadline in the All Electric Buildings Act to require new buildings under 6 stories to be all-electric.
Climate Can’t Wait is a collaboration of 40 climate groups in NY urging the state legislation to take action on key issues. See its 2026 policy agenda and its annual report card on the Governor.
GELF endorses the Renewable Heat Now campaign, which includes using air heat pumps and geothermal energy to heat and cool buildings rather than natural gas or other fossil fuels.
GELF Community Radio
GELF is aligned with the Sanctuary for Independent Media. GELF operates WOOA, a low-power FM community radio station in Albany and helps produces Hudson Mohawk Magazine, an hour-long radio show that runs on 7 radio stations in the Capital District. You can listen to individual segments here.
Lights Out Norlite – Shut Down Hazardous Waste Incinerator in Cohoes
GELF serves as the fiscal sponsor for the project to shut down the Norlite hazardous waste incinerator in Cohoes NY. After years of organizing, the plant two years ago did stop burning hazardous waste. It is unclear what the future of the plant is. Facebook page
Norlite is a toxic waste incinerator located in Cohoes, NY. For more than fifty years Norlite has released toxic pollution on the New York Capital Region and beyond. Saratoga Sites, a public housing complex home to 70 families, is just 400 yards from Norlite’s stacks. Those families awere relocated because of Norlite’s pollution. Norlite has been fined repeatedly for violating environmental regulations, including for mercury, heavy metals, VOC’s, and toxic dust emissions.
In December 2022, GELF and LON, filed papers in State Supreme Court in Albany to intervene in the lawsuit New York State, led by the State Attorney General (AG), has filed against the company. In the complaint, the plaintiff brings tort claims against Norlite, whose permits to operate expired two years ago, for its wrongful operation of the Facility and a cross claim against DEC for a declaratory judgment that allowing the Facility to continue to operate violates Plaintiffs’ right to clean air and a healthful environment. The plaintiffs want the plant shut down.
Past History: Norlite, LLC, was founded in Cohoes in 1956 and employs 70 people. It manufactures ceramic lightweight aggregates from shale. Norlite mines the shale from an on-site quarry and processes it in a high-temperature kiln (See http://www.norliteagg.com/about for a description of the product). Norlite fuels the kiln using toxic waste and natural gas– there are only two kilns in the country used to make aggregate in this way. Aggregate is used in construction projects. Norlite is the only commercial hazardous waste incinerator in the state of New York. It accepts some of the most toxic materials from throughout the northeast for disposal. large portion of Norlite’s revenue comes from incinerating this waste. Norlite is now owned by Tradebe USA, a multi-national company based in Spain.
Norlite has continued to operate for decades in a residential community despite repeated health and air complaints. Residents have long complained about odor, dust and air-pollution related illnesses. Other neighbors complain about the damages done to their home foundations from the regular blasting in the quarry at the facility.
Alliance for a Nuclear Free New York
Governor Hochul has become a big proponent of nuclear power. In June 2025 she directed the New York Power Authority to construct a new “advanced” nuclear plant in upstate New York, at least partially to meet the electricity needs for a new Micron chip factory in the Syracuse area. Her administration later proposed extending the $7.6 billion bailout of four aging upstate nuclear reactors by several decades, adding as much as $30 billion in subsidies to customers’ utility bills. She now wants to build 5 nuclear power plants
Nuclear is not a climate solution. The Governor has incorrectly cited nuclear as carbon free in a false effort to help achieve the state’s climate goal of 100% carbon free electricity by 2050. Nuclear power is not carbon free when the lifecycle of the plants are considered, with carbon emissions occurring during construction; mining, processing and transportation of the uranium fuel; and the storage of the dangerous radioactive wastes for tens of thousands of years. Nuclear power continues to have significant safety problems. While the industry likes to portray the 1.5% rate of major accidents such as core meltdown as “minor,” such incidents in fact have caused tremendous harm. The industry has been plagued by long construction delays and massive cost overruns
Global warming has already breached the 1.5 degree C target to cap global warming that was approved at the Paris climate accords a decade ago. Recent reports show that the world will exhaust the remaining carbon budget for the 1.5-degree target within 2 years at the current rate of emissions. Nuclear power plants, which often take in excess of a decade to build, will come online far too late to impact on the 1.5-degree target.
Legislation will be introduced for a two-year moratorium on any state funding for nuclear while its financial and environmental impacts are reviewed.
“Nuclear Renaissance” Is An Industry Sales Pitch for More Corporate Welfare. As Amory Lovin notes: “An intensive influence campaign seeks to resurrect a “nuclear renaissance” from the industry’s slow-motion collapse as documented in the independent annual World Nuclear Industry Status Report. Claims that past failures won’t recur have convinced many politicians that socializing nuclear investments rejected by private capital markets, weakening or bypassing rigorous safety regulation, suppressing market competition, and commanding military reactor and data-center projects as a national-security imperative will restore nuclear expansion and transform the economy. This illusion neatly fits the industry’s business-model shift from selling products to harvesting subsidies.
The first call in the US for a Green New Deal was done by the Green Party in 2010 (greens in Europe had launched the effort several years previously). The original GND, an economic stimulus recovery response to the global financial collapse, combined a rapid ten-year transition to 100% renewables, zero-emissions with the implementation of an Economic Bill of Rights (guaranteed living wage jobs, universal health care, housing, education) as FDR had called for in his last two State of the Unions. It also supported major cuts (50 to 75%)in the Pentagon budget as a principal way to fund the effort, along with a robust carbon tax. (Here is an outline of differences between the Green’s ecosocialist Green New Deal and the various versions promoted by Democrats and other climate groups. Here is a webinar of the GND from the EcoAction committee in March 2026.)
Campaign for 100% Renewable Energy by 2030, Ban on New Fossil Fuels – CLCPA Implementation
In 2015, GELF decided to try to implement the study done by Stanford and Cornell professors during the successful fight to ban the
hydrofracking of natural gas that showed that NY could meet its energy needs through renewable energy rather than natural gas. A major focus was the expansion of offshore wind off of Long Island. GELF drafted legislation (The OFF Act) to move New York to 100% clean renewable energy (no nuclear) by 2030 with net zero greenhouse gas emissions (using regenerative agriculture for offsets) with a halt to new fossil fuel infrastructure. The law would also have required local governments to develop and implement climate action plans.
In June 2019, Governor Cuomo and the State legislature instead adopted the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) which has a much slower timeline (net zero by 2050, with only an 85% reduction in emissions.) The law fails to call for a halt to fossil fuel infrastructure. It largely enacted the existing Executive Order from 2009 on climate including a process for a state climate plan by 2023. The final bill stripped out the labor protections activists had sought, failed to fund a Just Transition for impacted workers and communities dependent on fossil fuels, and weakened the requirement to invest climate funds in environmental justice communities (a goal of 35% for new funding).
The bill did set a goal of 70% renewable energy for electricity (about a quarter of emissions) by 2030, and 100% from clean energy (i.e., with nukes) by 2040. It also set goals for Off Shore Wind of 9,000 MW by 2035.
Climate Scoping Plan by Climate Action Council is far too slow
The Climate Action Council, primarily members of the Governor’s administration with some members appointed by the State Legislature, finally adopted the climate scoping document required under the CLCPA in December 2022. (See GELF’s comments on the initial draft.)
The “scoping” plan unfortunately is not a plan – nor does the CLCPA actually require one. It lacks clear actions, timetables, and funding. While it contains useful analysis of the climate challenges facing New York, its purpose is more to lay out questions that the Hochul administration (i.e., DEC, PSC, State Energy Master Plan) will now seek to provide more detailed responses to in the next 12 months to 3 or 4 years. New York will continue to avoid making the hard choices while climate change and extreme weather continue to accelerate. The UN has warned that the window to act to avoid climate collapse is rapidly closing, with at best another five to seven years before it is too late – assuming we haven’t already passed that point. (Read GELF’s response to the scoping plan.)
A critical question is whether state lawmakers will finally step up to the plate after 30 years of inaction on climate and energy, rather than leaving it in the hands of the Governor. Lawmakers should speed up the timetable. They need to raise a lot of money quickly. They need to reject the false climate solutions, greenwashing, and corporate welfare that played a major role in the Hochul (Cuomo) administration.
While the CLCPA set much weaker goals than the bill drafted by GELF and has even slower timelines for renewable energy and greenhouse emission reductions adopted by the Biden administration, most observers doubt that the state will achieve even the reduced goals. The state has a long history of failing to meet its climate goals. Twenty years after Governor Pataki first set goals to significantly expand renewable energy, the state gets less than 6% of its electricity from wind and solar. Most of its renewable energy comes from hydro projects built during the New Deal of FDR.
Divest from Fossil Fuels
On December 9, 2020, the NYS Comptroller, after an eight-year campaign by 350NYC and DivestNY, of which GELF was an active participant, announced that he had agreed to divest the $230 billion state pension fund from the riskiest fossil fuels and to decarbonize the entire fund by 2040. NYC officials had made a similar announcement three years previously. (See media coverage.)
100 state legislators had signed on as co-sponsors to the divestment legislation before DiNapoli made his announcement. The failure to divest over the last decade had cost the state more than $22 billion in lost value has fossil fuels have been the worst performing sector on Wall Street. The fund had held over $12 billion in fossil fuels, including more than $1 billion invested in ExxonMobil alone. DivestNY had pointed out that it was morally wrong for the state to seek to profit from the burning fossil fuels which threatens the future of life on the planet.
Unfortunately, on Valentine’s Day in 2024, DiNapoli reversed his position on large gas and oil companies two years ago, claiming they were now committed to climate action.
DivestNY Teachers is focusing on the New York State Teachers’ Retirement System (NYSTRS), which has an estimated $4.5 billion invested in climate destroying fossil fuels with over $500,000,000 invested in Exxon Mobil alone. However, the staff and board of NYSTRS remain oppose to divestment, despite dozens of teachers’ union passing resolutions in support.
Stop the Money Pipeline is a similar campaign to stop the financial sector (banks, insurance companies, assets managers) from funding, insuring and investing in the climate crisis. For instance, JP Morgan Chase is the world’s top banker of fossil fuels, providing $196 billion in funding to fossil fuel companies since 2016.
State Carbon Tax and Carbon Pricing
A carbon tax is an “upstream” tax on the carbon content of fossil fuels (coal, oil and natural gas) and biofuels. A carbon tax is the most efficient means to instill crucial price signals that spur carbon-reducing investment. The biggest obstacle to clean energy is that the market prices of coal, oil and gas don’t include the true costs of carbon pollution. (read more).
In 2015, GELF helped write a state carbon tax that would require polluters to pay for the damages caused by burning fossil fuels. NY Renews has also developed the Climate and Community Investment Act which they refer to as a polluter penalty bill. This bill seeks to raise $10 billion a year but NY Renews has largely stopped pushing it to due to opposition by the Governor and lawmakers.
The climate scoping plan does call for the state to enact an expanded cap-and-trade program (termed cap-and-invest), though there are few details. This is similar to the existing regional cap-and-trade program (RGGI) for electricity producers, Cap-and-trade programs however are strongly criticized on equity grounds by environmental justice groups. The Congressional Research Service concluded that RGGI’s direct impacts on emissions reductions have been negligible, partially because the price of carbon ($12 a ton) is so low and the cap on emissions is too high.
Governor Hochul, however, has halted her efforts to enact her cap-and-invest program, after apparently finally realizing that putting a price on carbon means that fossil fuel products (such as gas for vehicles and home heating) would be more expensive. While an energy tax is regressive – since low and moderate income households spend more money on energy than the wealthy – one can address this by providing a rebate to consumers, The bill that GELF helped draft rebate 60% of the revenues to low and moderate income households, providing a postive net gain.
The NY ISO, which regulates the wholesale electricity market, has developed their own carbon pricing proposal in response to Governor Cuomo using the social cost of carbon as the legal basis for his $7.6 billion bailout of three upstate nuclear plants. (An overview of national ISO carbon pricing proposals.)
Some groups such as Food and Water Watch oppose a carbon tax as a market device that enable polluters to continue to burn fossil fuels. They advocate instead for mandatory emissions reductions.
Presidential Executive Orders on Climate Change
In addition to calling for the enactment of a Green New Deal at the national and state level, GELF supported the call for President Biden to take executive action on climate change without the need for Congressional approval (see climatepresident.org). We need to act like It includes setting a goal of moving to 100% clean electricity by 2030. It embraces a commitment to environmental justice for frontline communities and a Just Transition to ensure that all individuals benefit from the changes. Most importantly, it calls to keep fossil fuels in the ground, including a halt to new fossil fuel infrastructure. And a ban on fracking.
GELF opposes the push to invest tens of billions in carbon capture technology, viewing it as corporate welfare greenwashing designed to allow the continued use of fossil fuels.
Read GELF’s analysis of the Inflation Reduction Act Congress adopted in August 2022 as a very slimmed down version of Biden’s initial Build Back Better proposal, which itself was far weaker than the Green New Deal proposed by the green movement.
Halt Single-Use Plastics
The proliferation of single-use plastic around the world is accelerating climate change and should be urgently halted, a report warns. Plastic production is expanding worldwide, fueled in part by the fracking boom in the US. Plastic contributes to greenhouse gas emissions at every stage of its lifecycle, from its production to its refining and the way it is managed as a waste product. Plastics are a major climate issue. Plastic production will soon exceed the greenhouse gas emissions from coal plants. (The New Coal: Plastics and Climate Change.)
Ethane cracker plants are the fossil fuel industry’s latest attempt to lock us into a dirty energy economy, bringing extensive and expensive infrastructure that fills our air and water with toxic chemicals while contributing to the climate crisis and slowing the transition to renewables. The worst part is that these plants aren’t just bad for the planet. They’re bad – really, really bad – for our health, spewing all kinds of dangerous chemicals into the air. According to the American Chemistry Council – the industry is looking to invest over $200 billion on new ethane cracker facilities and projects in order to capitalize on the abundance of cheap natural gas.
Single-use plastics are a glaring example of the problems with throwaway culture. We produce 300 million tons of plastic each year worldwide, half of which is for single-use items. That’s nearly equivalent to the weight of the entire human population. Reducing plastic use is the most effective means of avoiding this waste (and the impacts linked to plastic production and use).
Over time, sun and heat slowly turn plastics into smaller and smaller pieces until they eventually become what are known as microplastics. These microscopic plastic fragments, no more than 5 millimeters long, are hard to detect—and are just about everywhere. They end up in the water, eaten by wildlife, and inside our bodies. For wildlife, microplastics can be particularly dangerous; when eaten they can easily accumulate inside an animal’s body and cause health issues,
GELF works with Beyond Plastics.
In recent years, legislatures across the country have debated various Extended Producer Responsibility acts. Those who produce waste should be held financially responsible for its safe disposal. Realizing that the public increasingly wants such measure, the packaging and waste industry has developed legislation that embraces the concept while writing the details to benefit the waste producers. Beyond Plastics has developed the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act (PRRIA), which has tremendous public support but was killed by the Speaker of the Assembly in the waning hours of the last two legislative sessions. More than 120 lobbyists and firms have been hired to kill the bill. The industry opposes: setting goals to reduce the amoung of packaging (30% over 12 year); banning certain toxic chemicals from packaging; and now allowing chemical recycling (incineration) to count as “recycling.” Below is the bill sponsor’s memo
The average New Yorker creates nearly 5 pounds of trash every day, which means our state produces approximately 15 million tons of waste each year. 14 million tons of waste is produced by New York City alone. This waste primarily goes to landfills and incinerators, but can often end up in our water, natural habitats, and municipal spaces. The 2021 recycling rate for the United States has been estimated to be between 5-6%. While New Yorkers understand the importance of reducing our waste, reusing what we can, and recycling- our current system is not meeting our environmental demands. Local governments continue to struggle with recycling costs and infrastructure, which is seen through increased taxes or significantly limited materials that can be collected.
The Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act would require companies with net income over $5 million who sell or distribute certain materials and products to reduce packaging, improve recycling and recycling infrastructure, financially support municipal recycling programs, and reduce toxins in packaging. This legislation shifts the onus of recycling and waste hauling for packaging from municipalities and residents and ensures that producers of products are serving our interests by establishing solutions to sustain- able packaging. Thus far, many states have implemented similar programs including Maine, Oregon, Colorado, California, Europe, and India, New York State must follow suit to meet the moment for environmental accountability.
April 19, 2026
Green Education and Legal Fund Inc.
GELF is a 501(c)(3)nonprofit dedicated to promoting the green values of nonviolence, ecology, democracy and justice.
Organized in 1998, the purposes of GELF include conducting research and education in furtherance of the green principles of ecology, grassroots democracy, non-violence, social and economic justice, decentralization, community economics, feminism, respect for diversity, personal and global responsibility, and future focus.