Bill Summary – FastDemocracy

SECOND REGULAR SESSION
                     HOUSE CONCURRENT
                      RESOLUTION NO. 63
                             102ND GENERAL ASSEMBLY
                             INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVE PHIFER.
    5301H.01I                                                      DANA RADEMAN MILLER, Chief Clerk



           WHEREAS, the overwhelming consensus of climate scientists and the broader
scientific community recognizes that the long-term warming of our planet and increased
occurrences of extreme weather events are a result of anthropogenic climate change; and
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       WHEREAS, greenhouse gas ("GHG") emissions emitted from the combustion of
fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas are recognized as the principal cause of
anthropogenic climate change; and
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       WHEREAS, the federal government of the United States of America has recognized
the importance of this issue through policy and legislation including, but not limited to:
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       (1) Joining as a signatory to the landmark United Nations Paris Climate Accords,
committing the United States to reducing GHG emissions in accordance with international
law;
       (2) The Obama-Biden Administration's "Clean Power Plan", which had a stated goal
to gradually reduce reliance on coal for energy production and transition to renewable sources
such as wind and solar; and
       (3) The Biden-Harris Administration's recent approval of GHG emissions disclosure
as part of environmental review for all relevant federal projects and policy; and
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       WHEREAS, the citizens of the State of Missouri recognized the importance of
addressing climate change by voting in favor of renewable energy and electricity by a
supermajority in the 2008 Proposition C Referendum; and
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       WHEREAS, the State of Missouri has experienced a recent surge in extreme weather
events cited by scientific experts as symptoms of larger trends related to climate change
including, but not limited to:
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         (1) Increased occurrences of flooding events, such as that of the Des Peres River in
 St. Louis County and City in July 2022, responsible for millions of dollars of damage,
 displacing hundreds from their homes;
         (2) A record number of days with an unhealthy concentration of ground-level ozone
 in the air during the summer of 2023, exceeding the combined ground-level ozone quantity of
 both 2020 and 2021;
         (3) Increased temperatures that expand the range of habitable environments for
 disease vectors such as mosquitoes and ticks, bringing the Zika virus and Lyme disease closer
 to densely populated areas and the majority of Missouri’s population;
         (4) An expected increase by a factor of five within the next twenty-five years in the
 number of days per year with temperatures in excess of 95°F, quintupling the number of
 extremely hot days that Missourians experience by 2050;
         (5) Hot weather is documented to have deleterious effects on human health,
 exacerbating preexisting health conditions in vulnerable populations such as the elderly; and
         (6) Hot weather has similar damaging effects on plant and animal life, contributing to
 a decrease in the agricultural output that sustains thousands of Missouri families; and
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         WHEREAS, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 ("IRA"), passed by the 117th
 Congress of the United States of America and signed into law by President Joseph R. Biden,
 will raise over seven hundred billion dollars in revenue, of which three hundred sixty-nine
 billion dollars will be used for investments into the nation’s energy security and climate
 change; and
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         WHEREAS, the IRA authorized billions of dollars in funding, rebate, and tax
 incentive programs for both investor-owned and cooperative utilities to upgrade existing
 electric infrastructure, construct new facilities, and extend job training and apprenticeship
 programs in the clean energy sector; and
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         WHEREAS, of this funding, twenty-seven billion dollars was assigned to the
 Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund to be administered by the Environmental Protection
 Agency, organized into multiple distinct grant competitions between state, local, and
 municipal governments, nonprofit organizations, green and energy infrastructure banks, and
 coalitions between said entities, which will compete for the following grant programs:
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          (1) Solar for All, a seven billion dollar grant competition for sixty awards between all
 fifty states, tribal nations and governments, and U.S. Overseas Territories, with preference for
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 geographic and demographic diversity and cohesiveness, to install and operate solar energy
 projects in low-income communities;
         (2) The National Clean Investment Fund, a fourteen-billion-dollar fund used to
 provide green financing institutions with available capital to distribute to local clean energy
 projects and plans; and
         (3) The Clean Communities Investment Accelerator, a six-billion-dollar fund used to
 distribute funding to eligible nonprofit organizations capable of distributing funding to locally
 based and small-amount lenders and financing institutions to create equitable capital
 availability for people in all communities interested in constructing clean energy projects; and
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        WHEREAS, additional funding is available to the aforementioned entities through
 additional grant programs administered by other agencies and programs outside of the
 Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, such as:
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         (1) EPA Environmental Justice Block Grants, small grants drawn from a three-
 billion-dollar fund dedicated to mitigating environmental harms in disadvantaged
 communities, administered by a community-based nonprofit or collaboration between
 subnational governments and nonprofit organizations;
         (2) EPA Climate Pollution Reduction Grants, grants for air quality and pollution
 regulation agencies to implement projects or measures that reduce greenhouse gas emissions
 and other air pollutants;
         (3) The EPA Clean Ports Program, a three-billion-dollar pool to fund zero-emission
 port equipment and technology to help ports develop climate action plans to reduce air
 pollutants, administered by local port authorities and/or the government liable for the
 operation of ports of eligibility;
         (4) The EPA Clean School Bus Program, a five-billion-dollar fund to replace existing
 school buses with zero-emission and low-emission models for public school districts; and
         (5) The HUD Green & Resilient Retrofit Program, a fund to improve energy or water
 efficiency, indoor air quality, sustainability, or climate resilience; implement low-emission
 technologies, materials, or processes, including zero-emission electricity generation; energy
 storage; and building electrification in eligible privately owned and federally subsidized
 affordable housing; and
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         WHEREAS, the Inflation Reduction Act and the administrative agencies tasked with
 distributing its citizen- and government-oriented programs, along with the Environmental
 Protection Agency and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, have indicated
 preference for geographic and demographic diversity and cohesiveness among grantees; and
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102
         WHEREAS, the Inflation Reduction Act also extended both Investment Tax Credits
 ("ITC") and Production Tax Credits ("PTC"), tax rebates that substantially incentivize and
 reduce costs for construction, maintenance, and operation of clean energy projects, making
 clean energy cheaper and more accessible than it has ever been before, including higher
 profitability than coal and oil power plants:
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        NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the members of the House of
 Representatives of the One Hundred Second General Assembly, Second Regular Session, the
 Senate concurring therein, hereby encourage the State of Missouri, and all governmental and
 nongovernmental entities subject to its jurisdiction, all eligible individuals, and nonprofit
 organizations to pursue funding available within the Inflation Reduction Act; and
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         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that cooperation among all Missouri grant
 applicants is essential to bring the needed investment in vocational training, jobs,
 infrastructure, energy resilience, disaster adaptation, and sustainability that our state
 deserves; and
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          BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Department of Natural Resources is urged
 to require all departments and entities subject to its authority to take full advantage of
 available funding to improve the quality and health of Missouri's natural environment, which
 its citizens desire to protect and preserve, in addition to relevant air pollution measures
 recognized to have a positive effect on human health; and
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         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Public Service Commission of the State of
 Missouri is urged to emphasize the importance of a just transition to renewable energy and
 that all investor-owned and cooperative utilities in the state should be aware of available
 funding to build climate resilient infrastructure without increasing rates for ratepayers; and
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         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that investor-owned and cooperative utilities across
 the State of Missouri currently have the opportunity to upgrade the infrastructure and power
 generation facilities they are required by law to maintain with available grant funding and to
 increase compliance with the Missouri Public Service Commission's requirement that utilities
 operating within the state consider their own climate strategies within their triennial
 Integrated Resource Plan updates; and
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          BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the citizens of the State of Missouri are urged to
 utilize funding available in the Inflation Reduction Act to install small-scale renewable
 energy projects on their property and use federal rebates to install energy efficiency and
 electrification upgrades at reduced cost; and
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         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the citizens of the State of Missouri recognize
 the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to justly transition
 our state away from its unsustainable reliance on coal towards renewable energy sources that
 do not adversely affect the health of its citizens and that the moneys available to the State of
 Missouri, its corporations, utilities, utility ratepayers, county governments, city and municipal
 governments, and nonprofit organizations will disappear and be awarded to other regions of
 the United States unless Missourians step forward to apply for aforementioned grant funding;
 and
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        BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Chief Clerk of the Missouri House of
 Representatives be instructed to prepare a properly inscribed copy of this resolution for each
 member of Missouri's Congressional delegation.
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