Publicly Owned Renewables: How did NYC’s Build Public Renewable Act happen?
by Anjali Madgula
Site Description:
In 2023, New York state passed the Build Public Renewables Act (BPRA). This landmark bill authorizes the New York Power Authority to build publicly owned renewable energy projects with a good green jobs program for workers to transition from the oil and gas sector. This effort was won through over 4 years of grassroots organizing in New York. How did this win happen? What multiple approaches were taken in this fight? The Build Public Renewables Act is an important local model for a just transition and a Green New Deal that prioritizes public and not private ownership of our power grids. To understand its significance we also must explore the history of public power programs in the United States, starting with New Deal era federally owned public power agencies. The coalition that won BPRA was largely led by NY’s chapter of Democratic Socialists of America. My project thus explores the politics behind NY’s BPRA campaign and how public power is rooted in fighting for energy justice, a term that has been used to describe efforts to fight for equal access to energy for all. By understanding BPRA’s history, its significance, and the obstacles that the coalition faced in trying to pass it, we can map out possibilities to expand public power programs in the United States.
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Primary Sources:
Approach: I feel that my secondary sources offer a range of perspectives on the history of energy justice, energy democracy, public power projects, New York environmental organizations, and labor and environment scholarship. While I am sure there are primary sources that might be helpful from various perspectives and time periods, I want to start with primary sources that are directly about the BPRA (Build Public Renewables Act) during the time period of 2019 (when it was launched) to now. This allows me to get an understanding of the fundamental facts, reactions, and debates around the BPRA. Once I have that I can try to explore and see what other primary sources to reference. As I mentioned in my site description, I am very interested in three things; how this win even happened/how did people organize for it, how will it be enforced, and why labor and climate organizing must be intertwined. For the sake of this assignment, I will mostly focus on the primary sources that share interviews and detailed timelines about how the act came to be.
1. Build Public Renewables Act Senate Assembly Legislation (pages 115-143), February 1, 2023, State of New York, Senate-Assembly https://legislation.nysenate.gov/pdf/bills/2023/s4006c#page=115
The actual legislation is interesting to read. The BPRA is considered an amendment to the Public Authorities Law. The law details the various deadlines for New York state, through the NYPA (New York Public Authority) to implement, defines terms like renewable energy and decarbonization (“eliminating all on-site combustion of fossil-fuels and associated co-pollutants with the exception of back-up emergency generators”). As I do more research, I plan to reference the language of the legislation.
2. “After a four-year campaign, New York says yes to publicly owned renewables”, Akielly Hu, Grist Magazine, May 4, 2023
Grist is a prominent environmental journalism outlet and their article was one of the top hits when googling the BPRA. The article feels like an essential understanding of the base implications of the law, who was involved in pushing for it and what it might inspire with other environmental organizations in other states. The article also interviews a key actor in this law’s passing, Sarahana Shrestha, state assembly woman in New York who was key to pushing for the act. There is a good quote from Shresta in the article, stating that the BPRA addresses, “fundamental questions about who should own energy, who should serve energy, at what cost, and what kind of energy should we be making, and who should be deciding those things.” While it is a wordy quote, I think it is an easy way to understand what questions are at stake when moving from a private model to public ownership.
3. “The Problem with New York’s Public Power Campaign — and How to Fix It”, Matt Huber, Fred Stafford, July 30, 2022, The Intercept
https://theintercept.com/2022/07/23/new-york-build-public-renewables-act/
I wanted to include this article because it provides a more critical take on the BPRA and also highlights some of the obstacles to getting the act passed including how it failed to pass the State Assembly twice in 2020 and 2021. While the article was published before the bill did finally end up getting passed, I know from personal communication with the author Matt Huber that he still has some critiques about the process and the bill itself as it stands. Fleshing out some of these critiques can help me include in my report possible hiccups and areas of improvement that future bills in other states can learn from.
4. “Opinion: NY’s climate progress is failing. A new plan for public power can fix it.”, Julia Salazar, Sarahana Shrestha, July 27, 2024, City & State New York.
I chose this article because it is published in a local newspaper and is also written by two state assembly members who were key to passing the BPRA. They address us more recently, in the summer of 2024, to call out NY’s Governor Hochul for the lack of concrete progress in enforcing the BPRA. They share that there has been minimal transparency in the planning process and no public commitments to build clean energy, despite the law requiring such benchmarks. The article reads as a public record or public statement issued by elected officials calling out the Governor.
5. “Bulletin 134: A Public Power Victory in New York State – Build Public Renewables!”, June 2, 2023, Trade Unions for Energy Democracy website.
According to their website, Trade Unions for Energy Democracy (TUED) is a growing global network of over 120 unions and close allies working to advance democratic control and social ownership of energy. Partners include the CUNY union and the Rutgers Faculty Union. This article then focuses on the BPRA, praising its accomplishment and reflecting on how public power reduces the cost of utilities for low-income residents because there is no profit incentive like there is for companies like ConEdison or PSE&G.
6. “How New York’s Democratic Socialists Brought Unions Around to Public Renewables”, The American Prospect magazine, June 19, 2023. https://prospect.org/environment/2023-06-19-new-york-democratic-socialists-unions-public-renewables/
I chose this article because it focuses on the relationship between the organizers of the BPRA and labor unions. The article charts how at first many unions were opposed to the idea but with organizing, building relationships, and prioritizing labor protections, more were won over. I think that gathering more information to get clarity on the labor aspect of the law will be an important next step during my research for this project.
7. “Report: One-third of households struggle to pay energy bills”, Cathay Bussewitz, September 19, 2018, AP News.
https://apnews.com/national-national-general-news-7c9aa47401664a6aa8914ec3e69e9298
I chose this article because it was cited in the Grist article. I wanted to follow some of the citations for statistics on energy bills and racial justice. I think this article is important because it focuses on some prominent statistics that are often brought up in discussing this bill. The article states that nearly a third of U.S households have trouble paying their energy bill, disproportionately racial minorities.
8. “A Grid that Never Sleeps: Awakening New York City’s Renewable Potential”, Public Power NY Report, October 2024. https://publicpowerny.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/NYPA-NYC-Position-Paper.pdf
This is an original report created by the Public Power NY coalition, which is the primary group that fought for the BPRA. It is the latest of several relevant reports created by community groups that detail the importance of the BPRA. This report focuses on the future of the BPRA, how to implement it, advocates for more renewable projects to be implemented in downstate New York and not just upstate New York. The report highlights some intra-New York considerations I hadn’t thought of before. I think understanding the specifics of how organizers want things to be implemented now is important.
9. “You Can Win Bold Climate Laws in Your State”, Summer 2023, Hammer & Hope Magazine, https://hammerandhope.org/article/climate-public-power-new-york
I chose this article because I was interested in the interview of actual organizers who led the campaign for the BPRA. The interviewees answer questions about their own political perspectives, the connection between the BPRA and racial justice, and situate the win amongst many other organizing efforts across the country. I am interested in these interviews to really understand what motivated people to organize for this act.
10. “New York Socialists Won Big On Climate, How Did It Happen?”, September 12, 2023, In These Times Magazine. https://inthesetimes.com/article/new-york-build-public-renewables-socialists-climate
I chose this article because it not only includes interviews with organizers behind the BPRA, but also provides a history of similar climate bills in other states. The article provides a sort of literature review of various efforts for public power and climate labor legislation such as Illinois’ 2021 labor-led Climate and Equitable Jobs Act. The article also does a really excellent job of pinpointing a timeline of events to give context to the win. I noticed that multiple articles (including this one) have placed the BPRA in the context of Biden passing the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, providing direct funding for any public agency that builds renewable energy. The IRA helped the BPRA pass more smoothly. Reading these multiple articles about the act is definitely helpful for me to internalize some of the key important points in the story. A lot of the articles also pay tribute to FDR’s creation of the New York Public Authority.
Primary Source Analysis
“Billboard on 787 roasts Hochul over BPRA”, News 10 ABC, Johan Sheridan, March 22, 2023, https://www.news10.com/news/ny-capitol-news/kathy-hochul/billboard-on-787-roasts-hochul-over-bpra/
News 10 ABC is a local news channel for Albany, New York, affiliated with the mainstream media giant ABC. This article is tagged under “Hochul Administration” referring to Kathy Hochul, the first female governor of New York State, who was elected in 2021 as a Democrat and will hold her seat till 2026. This article, though it is in a mainstream media publication, takes a slightly positive view of the organizations pushing for the BPRA and their power, a slightly critical view of Governor Kathy Hochul’s administration’s climate policy, interspersed with the neutral storytelling that is expected of the news outlet. I find this slightly positive view to be evidenced by the language in the headline, the direct quote from the Public Power NY coalition, and the analysis of the Data for Progress survey.
The headline of this article uses the word “roasts” to describe the impact of the billboard that the Public Power NY coalition put up on the 787 Interstate highway. If the billboard was seen as not being effective, or the messaging not clear, then the reporter would likely not have chosen the word “roasts”. A roast implies not only that a statement was very critical and negative but that it was made with a level of power and boldness, and often clever rhetoric. The article headline also highlights what activists on the ground would want them to highlight, which is the bill that they are trying to pass, BPRA. By Including their target, their bill, and placing their billboard as an effective attack on Hochul, the headline implies a level of power on the part of the environmental coalition. The article then also serves to raise to public audiences an interesting headline about a public official getting roasted, to then lead them to read about the BPRA, and learn what it is, which arguably is the most important thing for the coalition to do: communicate with those who don’t know about the bill yet but might be favorable. The headline is placed next to/ under the picture of the actual billboard. When reading the headline with the billboard, the billboard itself looks clever, well crafted, and powerful. The art is effective, showing a hand with solar panels and wind turbines held in it. The slogan is clear and simple, putting the number of New Yorkers who want public renewables over the number of people who voted for Hochul, implying that Hochul can or will get voted out if she doesn’t support this bill, and support what New Yorkers want.
The article also includes a direct quote from the Public Power NY’s announcement of their billboard. By including this and not including any quote from someone in Hochul’s administration, the article empowers a direct voice of the environmental coalition with no direct oppositional voice. The quote is also a well chosen quote to depict the actual demands of Public Power NY, their reasoning for this billboard, and again underscores their anger and critique of Hochul. Activists of Public Power NY would likely appreciate this article because as many activists know, a public stunt like a protest or a sign is often done with the goal of media coverage. The billboard was already bold in its tone and an article that underscores that boldness and shows the seriousness of how organizers feel about this issue helps organizers get their public stunt more visibility. The article does not offer any critique of this quote, and instead ends on it. By ending there, and having the last words be from the coalition itself, we leave the article thinking about their message to Hochul and wonder what her next move will be.
Finally, the article details the Date For Progress survey which the Public Power NY coalition uses as the basis for their billboard statement. While mostly maintaining neutral, including pointing out that many people surveyed had never heard of the BPRA, the author does also mention that Hochul had won “by a much slimmer margin” than that 90% threshold of support. This discussion of the billboard’s credibility offers an analysis that readers can likely then agree that the billboard’s statement is credible. There is no harsh critique of the numbers used. By doing so, the billboard seems even more powerful and the messaging even more evocative and clever.
Secondary Sources:
Build Public Renewables Act Project Guayo, I. del (Iñigo del). Energy Justice and Energy Law. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2020. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/energy-justice-and-energy-law-9780198860754?cc=us&lang=en&
This book provides a quite recent review of energy justice in the context of law, energy poverty, and the UN Sustainability Goals. This book can offer a crucial framing of energy justice, energy rights, and the rights of communities to participate in decision making regarding energy projects. Uniquely, this book can provide historical context for landmark cases of enforcing energy regulation and how to protect our legal rights when navigating energy justice issues. The book covers a transnational framework of energy justice, from South America, to the Middle East, to the United States in the last few decades. Being able to take a broader look at the fight for energy justice can ground my project with the basic context of how different countries have approached this issue. When organizers and activists pushed to pass the BPRA (Build Public Renewables Act), it was because they had statistics that many New Yorkers were unable to make their utility payments each month. The goal was to help those who needed it most by raising the bar for us all, which is in tune with the theory of energy justice. This source can help me connect the dots between concepts of energy justice in the BPRA and across the world.
Barca, Stefania. “Laboring the Earth: Transnational Reflections on the Environmental History of Work.” Environmental History 19, no. 1 (2014): 3–27. https://doi.org/10.1093/envhis/emt099.
This article offers an analysis of the intersection of work and nature, specifically those who work in environmentally destructive industries and their relationship to their work and to their environments over the last century. The article can provide a framing for a political and cultural framework around how environmental policies must be labor-friendly. The article offers a literature review of various Marxist thoughts on work and nature interspersed with real case studies of workers engaging with environmentalism in Italy, Mexico, and Brazil. Barca also references Andrew Hurley’s work on Gary, Indiana, overall connecting the dots between various studies of workers and environmental movements. This article can provide me with context to consider the critiques that some have had of the BPRA and its involvement and dialogue with workers.
Tomoiaga, Alin Simion, Salwa Ammar, and Christopher Freund. “Case Study on Renewable Energy in New York: Bridging the Gap between Promise and Reality.” International Journal of Energy Sector Management 15, no. 1 (2021): 21–35. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJESM-02-2020-0016.
This article is focused on recent New York energy history and the path towards renewable energy. Since my project will dive into the history of the BPRA, it will be useful to read what people were thinking and where things were out before it was passed. The article suggests that environmental issues are tightly wrapped up with governmental politics in New York. While being clear about the role of politics, the study is highly scientific, offering a more mathematical and factual analysis of electric supply and energy modeling. While I am more interested in history, a scientific report focused on New York’s renewable energy feasibility is useful to reference.
Dick, Wesley Arden. “When Dans Weren’t Damned: The Public Power Crusade and Visions of the Good Life in the Pacific Northwest in the 1930s.” Environmental Review 13, no. 3/4 (1989): 113–53. https://doi.org/10.2307/3984393.
Much of my research has pointed me to consider the public power movement of the 1930s New Deal era. After all, the NYPA (New York Power Authority) that has the administrative responsibility for the BPRA, was created by FDR in 1931. FDR established the NYPA as a model for public power. Understanding the full history of the BPRA requires an understanding of what initial models for public power looked like and the legacy of those models today. The author of this article argues that simply because there was an interest in public ownership did not necessarily mean that advocates were critical of capitalism, the American dream, or infinite growth. There was still a view of nature as a commodity, just a government owned commodity. This is interesting to consider and compare to today’s public;y owned power movements.
Cebul, Brent. “Creative Competition: Georgia Power, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Creation of a Rural Consumer Economy, 1934–1955.” The Journal of American History (Bloomington, Ind.) 105, no. 1 (2018): 45–70. https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jay007.
Public scholars have lauded the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) as a positive model for public power ownership, a win of the New Deal that still exists and runs today, providing cheap public power for all. 60% of its workers are represented by unions, which is quite good especially for that part of the country. This article provides a history of the TVA, created in 1933 by FDR, allowing me to do a deeper dive into the history of publicly owned power through a concrete example. The article critiques the TVA’s history including its lack of opportunities for Black workers and exclusion of Black residents from the community model. Learning about the history of public power and racial discrimination is an important context for my project.
Huber, Matthew T. Lifeblood : Oil, Freedom, and the Forces of Capital. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2013. https://www.upress.umn.edu/9780816677856/lifeblood/
Huber’s book offers another angle for me to consider, which is to tell the story of the struggle for renewable energy policies through the story of our addiction to oil and gas over the last century. Our addiction to oil and our fetishization of oil in popular culture through slogans like “Drill, Baby, Drill” shows us that the hesitations towards a just transition in all aspects of energy use are quite deeply rooted and hard to challenge. Huber argues that as various politicians, companies, and lobbyists double down on championing the fossil fuel regime, there is probably no industry where the democratization of production is more necessary than energy. Huber argues that the biggest challenges to energy change are not technical but “cultural and political structures of feelings that have been produced through regimes of energy culture” (Huber, 169). This is an interesting framing that points out how there is a culture of fear that maybe any energy transition can result in energy scarcity, reduction of what people are allowed to do or how much energy each of us can use, etc. These fear mongering ideas of what a just transition can look like definitely stifle any major progress towards a just transition.
Carroll, William K. Regime of Obstruction : How Corporate Power Blocks Energy Democracy. Edmonton: Athabasca University Press, 2021. https://www.aupress.ca/books/120293-regime-of-obstruction/
This book offers a study of the efforts from corporations to wield their power and block any campaigns for energy democracy in contemporary times. It can provide me a reference point to consider what actors might have organized against the BPRA and how they wielded their power. Honing on the idea of energy democracy, this book addresses both the power and politics of the fossil fuel industry and activism against that power. This book explains how corporations can quell movements and spread propaganda that paints fossil fuels as a positive backbone of our country that we must preserve.
Allen, Elizabeth, Hannah Lyons, and Jennie C Stephens. “Women’s Leadership in Renewable Transformation, Energy Justice and Energy Democracy: Redistributing Power.” Energy Research & Social Science 57 (2019): 101233-. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2019.101233.
This article researches gender in energy justice and energy democracy movements, particularly the role of women’s leadership in these spaces. The article focuses on two women-led non profit organizations that are advancing renewable energy transition in contemporary times. One organization is Grid Alternatives which is a solar installation workforce training organization, and the other is Mothers Out Front which is an advocacy organization. By considering the role of women in energy democracy and the theoretical understandings that the article offers, I can think about the role of gender and women’s leadership in the coalitions that fought for the BPRA.
Sze, Julie. Noxious New York : The Racial Politics of Urban Health and Environmental Justice. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2007. https://direct.mit.edu/books/monograph/2798/Noxious-New-YorkThe-Racial-Politics-of-Urban
This book offers a deeper environmental justice history of New York that can allow me to draw any connections between the BPRA and other key environmental issues that are important to know about in New York. There is also a chapter in the book titled, “Power to the People? Deregulation and Environmental Justice Energy Activism” which documents planning board meetings, borough hearings, and community activism around energy policy in New York. The chapter highlights key community groups, landmark policies, federal offices, and key reports that were important in the 1980s to early 2000s in New York.
Roache, Kelly. “Energy Democracy in the Northeastern US: Case Studies from New York State.” In Climate Justice and Community Renewal, 1st ed., 222–35. Routledge, 2020. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429277146-15.
This chapter in a book about community climate organizing, is focused on energy democracy in New York in the late 1990s to early 2000s. This is helpful because it focuses on the democracy aspect which is important to the BPRA and it is focused on New York. The chapter analyzes efforts of the past to build renewables on a granular level of specific communities that tried to achieve community solar models. Roache argues that non profit organizations and houses of worship were central to these efforts while also adding a disclaimer that there is no one size fits all model for building renewable energy projects.
Image Analysis:
Graphic included in 2023 Building Public Renewables in the United States Report
The contrast is undeniable. In one world we continue to live and work under an all consuming cloud of industrial exhaust. In the other world, clean white unblemished clouds tell us we are doing a good job- there are no puffs of pollution emitting from our energy sources-instead solar panels and windmills quietly and smoothly harness the power already around us. Trees dot the peripheries of a flowing river, every house and building and school is covered by solar panels, no one is left behind. This image is designed by A.L McCullough as part of a report created by The Climate + Community Project and The Democracy Collaborative. It is published on the Public Power NY coalition’s website. The report titled “Building Public Renewables in the United States”, was released in March 2023, months before the victorious passing of the Build Public Renewables Act in New York state. The report was created partially in response to the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 which offers tax incentives for the creation of renewable energy projects. The report argues that while this is a good step, we need more than just tax incentives that nudge private companies to swap oil and gas economies for renewable energy. We need instead a “reordering [of] the electricity system so that it values good-paying jobs, justice, and democracy” (Page 7). The report aims to educate a public audience about this distinction between public and private renewable energy projects, elucidate some of the basic logistics behind renewable energy systems, and emphasize that public power is an environmental justice issue. The report starts with a key terms glossary that defines various types of energy projects based on their federal ownership, private ownership, or nonprofit ownership status, wanting us to be able to understand these distinctions that most of us do not know much about. This graphic that is presented at the start of this report keys us into a before and after, asking us to identify which one we want- the future that the Build Public Renewables Act can lead us into, or our current unsustainable way of life. The graphic’s use of dark and bright contrast and other key details obviously promotes the future that the BPRA envisions over our current way of life under fossil fuel supremacy. A graphic made by someone who opposes the BPRA would look entirely different.
The use of color is what draws one’s attention first. Darkness smears over the first image; the neat coexistence of blue, green, pink, and yellow offers a calm antidote in the second. Once we adjust to the designer’s presentation of two worlds side by side, we start to examine their differences. One key difference in the presentation of these snapshots is scale. In the second image, we quite literally are being asked to think about “the bigger picture”. A world zoomed out to encompass an entire working ecosystem where rows of houses all have solar panels on them, green spaces are in abundance, and only when you really spend time in that world do you realize there is an absence of something, the factory. The factory in the first image is what looms above all, replaced in the second image by windmills. The first image is one that is much more close to ground, barely encompassing an entire block of a city street. Yet, while we get such a small scale view, we still do see the factory in the distance and the storm of pollution above head, the atmosphere above feeling closer and heavier on its people and houses than in the second image. The artist playing with scale in these two images is an interesting choice. Why not keep the same scale for both? Here there is some level of reality check- quite frankly we are in the first image whether we want to be or not. We are stuck in a day to day cycle of thinking about our work life, our home life, and finding that changing our systems feels at times impossible. Thinking big picture and fighting for our collective attention to the bigger picture, the hope of a better world, is not easy. It won’t be easy to organize our block or our immediate circle, let alone our entire ward, our entire borough, our entire city, our state. But it does have to start with our immediate radius, our immediate block, getting people together where we are to slowly build from the small scale to the big. The graphic aims to be honest about the vision in the second image, it is quite far from being real but this report wants to make it more possible for us to get there.
Why are the features of the people in the first image more defined? Why can’t we see clearly the people in the second image and why are the only people there, workers? Here, scale and people go hand in hand. When I see the people in the first image, they look immersed in their world, with the exception of the five people on the rooftop holding a “WE NEED 2 BREATHE” banner. The people all look recognizable, either people alone arriving home, in their apartments, heading on a run after work maybe, or talking in a small group of friends. Their clothes feel familiar and they seem in motion, partaking in their mundane everyday routines. The people holding the banner, however, are choosing to speak despite a busy world around them that seems to not notice them. Yet their mission seems important, with the factory looming behind, it seems that they are acknowledging something very real that is happening in real time. The graphic shows us a world that is very much our current world. One man who looks like a utility worker in a bright green vest seems to be standing at his door looking at the protestors and thinking about their message. While this is a bleak image, the artist depicts possibility here, a possibility that is important, this world in this image is not doomed but requires action by the many people who are living their own lives to band together. In the second image, the artist chooses to highlight workers and only workers. The BPRA is a bill that affects workers and many have articulated that centering workers in fights for a just transition is vital. Energy workers deserve real assurances that they will be treated with dignity and good union jobs in a green economy. This image centers these workers, who ultimately will be the ones to lead us into a green future by constructing solar panels and windmills to replace pollutive factories. This image argues that a just vision for a green economy cannot be complete without a vision for good green jobs. There are no other people directly depicted in the second world but there is an assurance that all people will live equitably, all neighborhoods are treated equal in terms of resources and access by looking quite similar in this zoomed out scale. This vision is important to this report which details evidence of Con Edison (private energy distributor in NY) cutting off power in low-income black and brown communities in Brooklyn in 2019 during an energy crisis to save the greater grid. People who were already most affected by heat deaths in their community were now even more overburdened by no AC during a hot summer. Equity for workers and for overburdened environmental justice communities is highlighted in this graphic’s positive vision for a future made possible by BPRA. The need to act now in our current reality is also highlighted.
Cars in the first image are polluting big gusts of dark black clouds that drift upwards to the windows of apartment dwellers. They are run by oil and gas. The second image makes a point of painting charging symbols on the two small trucks tucked into the landscape, not taking much space, not producing any clouds of pollution. Two big cars being on a small block in this city implies many many other cars polluting across the city. In the second picture, you would imagine with scale we would see more cars, but we only see two as well. The BPRA is not necessarily even about electric vehicles but the artist chose to highlight them in this new world image. Building public renewables is not just about changing to renewable energy but imagining a different world in a multitude of ways. Reordering our economy will impact and change many sectors of our lives towards a green economy. Opening ourselves up to vast change is part of what the artist aims to depict. It can be scary to imagine everything changing, a world where fossil fuel hegemony is vanquished, but this artist asks us to imagine it anyway. The report then concretely outlines why that world is a good one. The imagery of electric cars symbolizes that the goal of this report is not single minded on windmills and solar panels but a different way of life in all sorts of ways. The fact that there are so few cars implies that this world is less car reliant, yet a lack of imagery of public transit or some other alternate green transit leaves some things up for our imagination. The artist is less interested in depicting exactly what our world would look like (this image is certainly not detailed enough to be a blueprint for change) but it tickles our imagination just enough to desire something better than dark clouds and polluted air.
While we know this graphic was designed for the Build Public Renewables report to promote the BPRA positively, it speaks to something beyond just one bill or one moment in time.The graphic represents a past and present of our country, old Pre-war apartment buildings, factories that have existed for decades, and people (us) who are continuing to live in a fossil fuel built world. The graphic also depicts a future that we can choose, that the people in the first image can herald into being. It articulates that for environmental justice to be achieved, we need working class people to demand public renewables, good green jobs, and equitable energy access for all.
