2009 CO Legislative Actions: Green Energy Bills

The Colorado legislature has been busy keeping Colorado’s New Energy Economy moving forward.  Recognizing the enormity of the risks climate change and foreign-supplied fossil fuels pose to Colorado’s health and safety, Democrats are pushing initiatives through that will benefit us all.  I tracked down the following bills that are or have been introduced in the Colorado legislature this year.  I’ve included basic descriptions of the bills to round out what’s going on. I’m going to go over the status of these bills in the future.

HB09-1149 “Solar Home Prewire And Consultation”, sponsored by Rep. Merrifield in the House and Sen. Morgan Carroll in the Senate would requires commercial home builders to offer prospective buyers the following:
1. The option of having the home include, or be pre-wired for, a solar photovoltaic installation; and

2. A list of local solar installers who can assess the home’s solar energy potential.

On a personal level, I’d rather see stronger language for increased solar power distribution in residences.  All houses should be pre-wired for solar PV.  There is simply too much infrastructure in Colorado’s metropolitan areas to not build solar PV out on a large scale.  Each panel would reduce the demand from GHG polluting power plants just that much more.  At the same time, I recognize that many people think these things probably need to be taken one step at a time.  The Governor’s Energy Office would maintain a list of expert solar system installers to be provided to anybody who requests a copy.  That’s a good idea.

More below…

2009 CO GOP Strategy Clear: Delay & Distract

The 2009 Colorado legislative session is underway and the Colorado Cons have made their intentions and general strategy quite clear.  They will spend the 120 legislative days delaying the work of the legislature and distracting from actual problems in the lead-up to next year’s elections.  A frame is being established and Democrats need to ensure things get done despite the wasteful tactics the Cons are employing.

Example #1: State Sen. Shawn Mitchell (R-Broomfield) led an attack on regulations that were released last month by the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.  He and his followers are using a false talking point in an attempt to eviscerate the regulations at the behest of the fossil fuel industry.  The talking point: any amount of regulation on industry activities will cause a devastating impact on the industry.  Instead of being manhandled by regulations, drilling corporations have consistently threatened to pull up their stakes and move to other states to do business.  This threat is simply ridiculous: would corporations willingly give up millions of dollars of profits in the face of justified regulatory activity?  Of course not.  But they keep pushing it nonetheless.

State Sen. David Balmer, not to be “out-talking pointed”, provided the following:

“By every metric I could see … the oil and gas business is declining in Colorado”

Sen. Balmer must not be looking very hard for metrics.  Oil and gas drilling operations have exploded across the state in the past 8 years, even during 2 years of Democratic Gov. Bill Ritter’s term.  I have a question for Sen. Balmer: what is the state of Colorado getting out of all of this new drilling?  More crime, more pollution, more use of taxpayer-funded  infrastructure (that the oil and gas corporations are not helping to pay for, by the way) and more negative impacts on tourism (hunting and camping, among others).  Meanwhile, Colorado isn’t receiving the tax payments it’s due because of an old exemption put in place to help the oil and gas industry establish themselves in the state.  Well, they’re plenty established, but still aren’t paying their fair share.  But they’ll happilly fear-monger the populace into believing they’ll leave if the status quo changes.  As an added note, Harris Sherman is quoted in the article as identifying falling commodity prices as the primary reason the gas industry has slowed down from its record pace last year.  Maybe Sen. Balmer should spend some more time in a basic economics course before throwing around b.s. causes.

Lawmakers will be allowed to amend the proposed regulations prior to their enactment.  I hope CO Democrats will not allow the Cons to wreck the process, which has already taken years.