It’s Friday, June 24, and Rhode Island is pulling ahead of the pack on clean electricity.
Rhode Island’s House and Senate approved far-reaching climate legislation this month, moving forward an ambitious bill to decarbonize its electricity
If enacted, House Bill 7277 and its companion bill in the Senate, S2274, would require the state’s utilities to buy enough renewable energy to offset their electricity generated by natural gas and petroleum by 2033 — the most ambitious timeline in the country. Rhode Island’s Democratic governor, Daniel McKee, is expected to sign the bill into law.
“Here in the Ocean State, we know that action to address the climate crisis cannot wait,” Representative Dominick Ruggerio, a Democrat who sponsored the Senate bill, said in a statement. Rhode Island has a mandatory, enforceable goal of hitting net-zero greenhouse gas emissions…