Over the last five years, at least 25 states have expressly preempted local governments from enacting requirements, or even incentives, to construct new buildings that do not rely on natural gas as a fuel source. On December 6, 2024, two local governments finally fought back in court. Seattle and King […]
Cities Climate Law Initiative
36 posts
Cities have a unique and significant role to play in responding to climate change. Many are already doing so by adopting legal and policy tools to encourage the use of smart surfaces—a group of technologies and design strategies that mitigate the effects of climate change in urban environments, especially extreme […]
On Friday, December 6, the Sabin Center filed an amicus brief on behalf of the National League of Cities and the U.S. Conference of Mayors in support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in Kentucky v. EPA as part of our ongoing amicus efforts to support strong federal climate […]
We know now that Donald Trump will take office as the United States’ 47th president this January, and that his stated desires for federal climate policy include withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, easing restrictions on oil drilling, and “rescind[ing] all unspent” Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) funds. For climate-forward cities, the […]
A New Way Forward for the Middle Class: A Plan to Lower Costs and Create an Opportunity Economy (the “Opportunity Economy” plan) yields just ten hits on the word “climate,” eight of which are in citations to other sources. Still, the Harris-Walz vision for an “Opportunity Economy” maps neatly onto […]
Today, the Sabin Center filed two amicus briefs—one on behalf of the National League of Cities and the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and a second on behalf of experts in carbon capture and storage (CCS) science and technology—in support of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in West Virginia v. […]
Two years into the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the several tax credits that are eligible for “elective pay” are starting to catalyze investment in renewable energy, electric vehicles, and EV charging by nontaxable entities like local governments and nonprofit organizations. Slower to develop is a robust, cohesive response by nontaxable […]
Every summer now feels like Groundhog Day. More heat records broken. Soon, we’ll have more school days canceled (take Philadelphia for example where nearly 30 percent of city schools recently shut down due to lack of cooling systems). We already have more heat-related deaths (in fact, according to a study, […]