Financing and Deploying Clean Energy Policy Memos

These policy memos were completed as part of the Yale Center for Business and the Environment’s online Financing and Deploying Clean Energy certificate program, which trains and connects rising leaders to catalyze the transition to a clean economy. The application for the certificate’s 2023-24 cohort closes on March 12. You can read what the application entailed, and what the program seeks to do, here.

We invite policy-makers and stakeholders to consider the ideas in these memos and respond. Views expressed in the memos are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect the positions of their employers.

This warehouse is not the only there there-house

This site in Lynchburg, VA evokes tobacco production - but the whole region can embrace clean energy generation. (Photo by Kipp Teague, via Flickr Creative Commons.) 

​​​​​​​Policy Memo: Using Experience to Transition the Tobacco Region's Energy Mix

The Tobacco Region of Virginia, as its name shows, knows economic transitions. It can use its expertise in workforce development and industrial support to train workers and incentivize investors to speed the clean energy transition through this historic section of a rapidly changing state.
Pensacola, Florida

The Gulf of Mexico on the Pensacola, Florida coast / Capt_tain Tom / CC BY 2.0

Policy Memo: Promoting Wind Deployment With Gulf Gusto in Texas and Louisiana

In the American Southeast, oil and gas developers have shown interest in learning the economics of offshore wind. States and the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management have wanted to encourage this interest. This memo sets out steps for state-federal cooperation to encourage offshore wind deployment around and across the...
Beauty isn't cheap:  community solar land can cost more than rates can support

Policy Memo: Promoting Agrivoltaics Through New York State's Model Solar Energy Local Law

Summary: NYSERDA should update its Model Solar Energy Local Law to include sample provisions that incentivize agrivoltaics. This will align agricultural preservation and renewable energy goals and promote community support for solar projects. NYSERDA should also provide training and technical assistance to local governments to help them adopt local law...
In the nation's Covid epicenter, a well-funded park stokes wellness

New York City's Brooklyn Bridge Park, here on a morning during the Covid shutdown, blends public and private capital to broaden open space access. More neighborhoods need parks like this. 

Policy Memo: The USA's Housing Department Should Inventory - and Slash - Emissions

In its $62.7-billion budget, HUD subsidizes 4.5 million units of housing in a portfolio directly owned or controlled through HUD partners. Furthermore, HUD resources are used by private developers through project-based vouchers and HOME funds. HUD has a great deal of power to drive the adoption of higher energy standards...
Goods that cross the ocean get crossed up in the supply crunch (photo courtesy Ana Ulin)

A container ship on its way to a commercial port...or is it? (Photo by Ana Ulin, courtesy Creative Commons.)

Policy Memo: Establishing a Pacific Coast Framework For Sustainable Maritime Fuels

The Pacific Coast of North America is home to five of the 10 largest continental ports, more than 55 million people and an economic output of $3 trillion (Pacific Coast Collaborative, 2022). Collaboration on the scale of the Pacific Coast can provide a cohesive approach to maritime industry decarbonization to...
This photo of a Buffalo, MN wastewater treatment site comes from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency's Flickr page.

Dirty Business: How Municipal Governments Can Lead in Reducing Emissions and Promoting Renewables

One proposed solution is to incentivize municipal wastewater treatment facilities to implement anaerobic digestion of biosolids and biogas capturing methods to produce Renewable Natural Gas (RNG), a renewable fuel used in the generation of heat and electricity, onsite or at a nearby centralized facility shared by multiple treatment facilities. This...
A car loads up on electricity, generating...value

(Courtesy Fairfax County, VA.) EV charging looks one way to flatlanders...

Policy Memo: Making Utilities Constructive in Maine's Electric Vehicle Buildout

Utilities whose businesses span rural and urban terrain can gain when they support the rollout of electric vehicle charging networks. This memo sets a framework for Maine's utility to meet policy objectives and secure market position.
Don't let the sun go down on price reliability, our author urges

(Photo by Don and Suzan Weller, via Flickr Creative Commons.) As the sun sets over Waterford, CT, an expert proposes a price floor in wholesale electricity markets. 

Policy Memo: How We Pay For Free Electricity

As New England states progress towards decarbonization goals, the electricity spot market will see offers from solar and wind generators that incur no marginal cost. That can harm reliability and put some operators hastily out of business. To retain existing resources and the stability they bring, we need to set...
A power plant in Ohio (photo by Neal Wellons via Flickr Creative Commons)

(Photo by Neal Wellons via Flickr Creative Commons.) This power plant in Painesville, Ohio could come in for big changes if citizens there follow the author's advice. 

Policy Memo: Quick Wins Are Possible Via Community Choice Aggregation For Clean Energy

Community choice aggregation is an enabling policy, currently available in at least nine states, that lets even the smallest cities cost-effectively transition to clean energy. It gives a municipality’s residents and businesses the chance to take advantage of cost-competitive (and, more and more, money-saving) clean energy by creating negotiating leverage.
Think of the power you could set free (affordably)!

(Courtesy Governor Phil Murphy's Flickr account.) A new capacity market framework for PJM could make offshore wind from this segment of New Jersey more competitive more quickly. 

Policy Memo: Federal Support on Capacity Can Boost Regional Wind Goals

Now, to advance the buildout of renewable energy, FERC should set a process and timeframe for adopting a new market structure. That structure should be adaptable and transparent, advance state offshore wind policy goals, meet consumer clean energy and equity goals, and maintain reliability.
A (very) old technology for transmission still holds in parts of South Carolina and other states.

(Photo by overWHAMmed, from Flickr Creative Commons). This transmission line in Pelzer, SC, testifies to the market potential for investment in new high-voltage lines. 

Policy Memo: Senators, Jolt Capital Via a Transmission Investment Tax Credit

Can transmission of clean energy become more competitive and more ambitious with a federal tax credit? The author, a sustainable finance professional, argues on a bipartisan basis that it can and that transmission tax credits will tap a multibillion-dollar pipeline of ready projects.
YPCCC-Maine

Policy Memo: Bring Batteries for a Virtual Power Plant and a Virtuous Cycle

Battery storage systems and virtual power plants offer an opportunity for individual ratepayers to improve energy reliability and contribute to Maine’s clean energy goals. Maine has several options for protecting and incentivizing ratepayers, especially low-income ratepayers, to own battery storage systems and join virtual power plant programs.
Patrick Kovarik.Getty Images took this photo for Fashionista.

(Photo by Patrick Kovarik for Getty Images in Fashionista, September 25, 2020.) Chanel once staged a fashion show with wind turbines. The author argues that assertive tax policy can make renewable wardrobes a fashion-forward investment. 

Policy Memo: A Good Look for Apparel's Industrial Decarbonization Path

The US, as the largest consumer and highest emitter of carbon per capita, bears a critical share of the responsibility to facilitate a transition to sustainable practices. ​​​​​This article lays out the rationale and a pathway for the US to incentivize the apparel industry’s decarbonization. I propose a preferential tariff...
Utility Solar in Spotsylvania County VA

(Photo by Hugh Kenny, Piedmont Environmental Council.) A solar array in Virginia stands for the kinds of investment that could crowd in with a properly targeted federal carbon price. 

Policy Memo: Lower Price, Higher Potential

Climate scientists in the latest Report warned that without immediate large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, climate change will cause devastating economic and human losses. Policymakers must come together to implement a comprehensive climate change strategy in the United States.
A row of typical United Kingdom houses

(Courtesy Billy Wilson, via Flickr Creative Commons.) The author argues that Octopus Energy needs to reach out to occupants of homes like these to make good on its post-carbon promises. 

Making 100% Clean Electricity Doable: A Strategy Memo to Octopus Energy

According to this consultant, Octopus Energy must build measurable positive momentum towards the customer-centric (and just) energy transition it implies in its branding. It should invest capital toward changes in marketing and customer support. By doing so, this memo suggests, Octopus can deliver more fully on its promise.
Targets for job creation lift at the local level in Ithaca, NY

(Courtesy of Jo Zimny Photos via Flickr Creative Commons.) Ithaca took its buildings off fossil fuel. It aims to take its job base in the same direction. 

Policy Memo: Making Buildings Carbon-Free to Make Real a Green New Deal

At the local level, a Green New Deal can crowd in private capital. In this update of a Financing and Deploying Clean Energy policy memo, the sustainability director for Ithaca, NY explains the holistic economic and energy-justice strategy driving the city's project to decarbonize all its buildings.
Transmission reform isn't a moonshot, but it needs federal action. (Photo by Ben Paulos.)

The current Congress has power to kick-start grid upgrades. Does it want to use that power to the fullest? 

Accelerating American Decarbonization Along the Regulatory Route: A Policy Memo

The author, an energy professional and Illinois resident, argues for transmission investment as a lynchpin of infrastructure investment. She makes the case that other infrastructure goals need robust clean-energy transmission to become real.
Climate attitudes in Colorado, courtesy the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication

With the Yale Program on Climate Change Communications showing this range of climate concern, should Colorado operate under one electricity provider? 

Decarbonizing the Rockies: A Policy Memo on Colorado's Electricity Market

Participants in CBEY's Financing and Deploying Clean Energy certificate program learn technology, finance, policy and climate science. Policy savvy locks in when they write real memos to real players. In this example, a professional in Colorado's community-solar industry encourages a state Senator to work on fostering competition in the state's...
It's morning in America

Could hydrogen signal a dawn in all sorts of clean infrastructure? 

H to Grow: Scaling Up Hydrogen to Lift American Prosperity and Justice

If the United States builds an investment theme around hydrogen, our author argues, a path to prosperity will widen. In this op-ed adopted from Yale's Financing and Deploying Clean Energy certificate course, an expert argues for building investment around a potentially plentiful and carbon-free source.
Let's get this turning

The EU needs to open financing channels to more providers to support the intent of the Green Deal.(Photo from Qvinnovindar.)

Walking the Walk: A Memo Outlining Incentives for Women-Powered Energy Storage in the European Union

Why should "prosumers" - individuals who make electricity for others to purchase- encounter brakes on their output in European Union policy? In this memo, which the author wrote first in the Financing and Deploying Clean Energy program, the case emerges for releasing female prosumers' entrepreneurial energy. A linked interview with...
What isn't in these numbers?

Delivering clean energy should mean delivering equitable health effects, says a researcher. 

Policy Memo: An Environmental Justice Analysis Can Accelerate Carbon Progress in Pennsylvania

The case for joining the , which Pennsylvania's governor embraced in 2019, asserts that trading carbon credits can marshal market discipline to achieve policy goals for broad decarbonization. In this example from the policy-memo segment of our online Financing and Deploying Clean Energy program, our writer argues...
Cory Connolly

Cory Connolly

Policy Memo: Saving Money in Michigan With Residential PACE Financing

Michigan can unlock energy-saving upgrades for homeowners by passing residential property assessed clean energy legislation. The legislation should guarantee energy savings and protect consumers by including a method for determining eligible energy-saving measures; restrictions to R- financing amounts and underwriting criteria; and robust consumer protection provisions.
Martha Danly

Martha Danly

Policy Memo: In Support of Pennsylvania Joining the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf proposed (RGGI) legislation in the fall 2019 legislative season. By voting to join RGGI, Pennsylvania can reduce electricity rates, improve the state and regional economy, and make the state a leader in the global effort to combat climate change.
Joe Indvik

Joe Indvik

Policy Memo: Establishing a National Energy Benchmarking Standard for Commercial Buildings

To capture the energy efficiency opportunity across the U.S. economy, the House Energy and Commerce Committee should introduce a bill to establish a national energy benchmarking standard for commercial buildings. Building on the success of local ordinances, the proposed bill would create a national requirement while giving state and local...
Techniques for turbines

(Photo from Energy News.) Wanja Wallemyr contributes millions of kilowatt-hours to a grid that doesn't properly value it. 

Qvinnovindar: Feeding Three Million Kilowatt Hours Into the Grid Each Year

What would a prosumer-friendly policy achieve? The Financing and Deploying Clean Energy participant who proposed that direction talked to an entrepreneur whose co-op feeds wind energy into Sweden's electricity system. Wanja Wallemyr's experience outlines what a grid full of prosumers can mean for power and empowerment.