 Good afternoon everyone. Welcome to our briefing this afternoon. My name is Carol Werner and I am the Executive Director of the Environmental and Energy Study Institute. And on behalf of EESI and our partners, the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, we are so glad that you are here with us this afternoon for this. What we think is both a very important and a very exciting topic on how businesses, cities, and states are leading climate action efforts. Just a month ago, there was a very, very large global climate change summit held in San Francisco that was hosted by Governor Jerry Brown, by Michael Bloomberg who is now the UN Special Envoy for Climate Action, and it also included China's Special Representative for Climate Change Affairs. And the summit attracted more than 4500 representatives to that, but there were also hundreds of side events across San Francisco, which spoke to both the energy, the concern, the innovation, the inspiration that we are seeing coming from people at all levels of the private sector, the public sector, whether it is mayors, city council people, governors, as well as their counterparts in other countries around the world, because this was indeed an international conference. We thought that it was so important that we wanted to hold a briefing here so that for many of us who were not able to be there, we would have a chance to hear from a variety of voices about what happened there, why people were committed, the kinds of commitments that were happening there, and why it is important. So to kick off our discussion this afternoon, we're going to first hear from Dan Carroll, who is the Senior Advisor for Infrastructure and Energy for the Office of California Governor Jerry Brown. And we wanted Dan to be here this afternoon to talk a little bit about kind of an overview about the conference, what it was, why it was important, what the governor's office saw coming out of this, and the kinds of work that they did with so many people both in the United States and across the globe in terms of this whole summit happening and now looking at steps coming out of that. Dan brings a lot of experience and particularly he focuses with regards to California on accelerating innovative climate finance projects and partnerships inside California regionally as well as nationally. He also directs the state's interagency opportunity zones workforce or workgroup and he serves on the Executive Committee of the U.S. Climate Alliance, which is a 16 state bipartisan alliance of states moving forward to implement the goals of the Paris Agreement. He brings experience also in the private sector and I think one of the things that is also important is that it just shows that he is an entrepreneur and is an innovative spirit at heart and that he is in a very exciting place at a time when there is so much work going forward on this whole issue. And of course all of this makes perfect sense in terms of thinking about how people are being brought together and that EESI was formed over 35 years ago by bipartisan congressional caucus for the purpose of talking about key issues trying to bring people together and find workable solutions. So with that, Dan. Get set up here. Good afternoon everybody. Good afternoon. So I see a clock back there so I'll try to keep my time but give me a two minute warning if I'm blathering too long, alright. So, let's see, I wanted to see if it's going to work. Voila, okay. So first of all I was asked to give kind of a read out on what happened at the summit and sort of a look ahead from our perspective California on how the business local state alliance can keep working together. So I think it would first help to talk a little bit about why we did the summit and basically three reasons for that. First, frankly, the reality of the Paris Agreement. As many of you know whether we're in the agreement or out of the agreement, the implementation of it is all about bottom up implementation to make our numbers by localities, cities, states, communities, business leaders, civic entrepreneurs, you name it. So if there's any silver lining in where the national government and the Trump administration is in pulling out of Paris, I would point out to you that at some level it removes every excuse for why we shouldn't expect Washington D.C. to fix everything and everyone needs to, wherever they're standing, sitting, working to get busy. So that was number one as to why we had the summit. The second reason we had is frankly we're going too slow in making our numbers, however you want to measure them in terms of carbon cuts. I'm one of the, was one of the co-leads of the climate finance bucket so it's good it's a business oriented group so tend to focus a little bit more on the climate finance side. But you know, Christiana Figueras has pointed out that we're basically investing about $250 billion every year in climate oriented low carbon projects. Wonderful, impressive, but we really need to be doing about a trillion dollars a year to make our numbers on the carbon side. So we needed to go faster and having while we've joked among ourselves and the organizers would we ever want or another sub national want to take on something like this. Again, there's no one like volunteering right now but this given the moment it was very important to have the event which brings me to the third reason we had. It was really to sort of make clear that we are still in movement broadly defined is in fact rallying together having, you know, as was pointed out we had about 4,500 delegates there, many of them international. So it was an opportunity to bring local implementers and innovators from across the globe but also to make clear that there are people in the United States that are still very much in the game and very committed to accelerating climate action. So how did we do? You know, I've shared with with base and ESI the full roster of commit commitments and announcements. It's also still available up on the website. Happy to work with you to get them out to people, but I just wanted to highlight a chunk of them. The ESPN stats 4,500 people more than 350 affiliate events. It was painful to miss out. There were some amazing side events, affiliate events that were going on through the week and work and commitments that happened there that, you know, we're still tracking down what happened and excited about some of the stuff that happened offstage on the main stage. I think we certainly checked the box for international leaders that there really is a we are still in movement. It's not a one day wonder. But it's the real deal. Take just one example of the US Climate Alliance. I'm very involved in, you know, this is 40% of the US population. We released our first annual report. So when the day when Paris happened and all these announcements were made, you roll the clock ahead at that point, I guess it was about 15 months. You know, we're actually got serious technical assistance, sharing of best practices, additional states joining. We had a major dialogue with North American leaders from Canada and Mexico. There's a major announcement on short lived climate pollutants. So again, the focus of this and not just with the US Climate Alliance is there's nerdy serious work going on to implement as opposed to this is just a press thing that happened and will happen again. On the investor side. I see and Kelly from series series pulled together 400 investors representing about $12 trillion and assets for a meeting announced the new investor agenda. Again, you can check their website for there. I was was thrilled to be at that meeting there were announcements made around doing an additional trillion dollars in green bonds and asked me what a green bond is after if you'd like like to do more. We also released a climate finance playbook during this major Friday finance roundup that we had at the end of the summit kind of indicating there's been a problem where different types of investors looking for different types of projects and different types of geographies are talking past each other. So we work with the UN PRI and others to put together kind of a simple playbook to help people find each other and to make those conversations move more quickly. A core announced that trillion dollars in renewable investment by 2030 the European investment bank not to be out done announced $1.4 trillion in by 2030 and renewable commitments that's with the euro it's a trillion and a trillion but it actually is at $1.4 trillion. 60 to sub nationals committed to 100% zero mission by 2050 California by 2045 just you know hey why not net zero building commitments at the meeting were made equivalent to 50 coal fired power plants. So in general you know I think we built up a lot of good momentum heading into COP 24 and the UN Secretary General's 2019 meetings on the climate finance side we put up in our playbook a little cute cartoon to kind of give a sense of where the climate finance tribe is heading over time of various mountains and challenges. I think most significantly though I think what we did there was drive what we call the high ambition model where we tried to create sort of ping pong between geographies so an example last year Governor Brown signed a landmark buy clean bill about 20% of our missions are actually embedded in the products that we buy from China and other places. As a result of that it led to some major activity from the Europeans around buy clean it was a very exciting side event the EIB trillion dollar matching a core was another example of high ambition so the friendly competition of Europe's doing well here or India's doing well here or China doing well there I think was really in terms of the program design we really wanted to make sure somebody was on stage they were responding with high ambition and in some cases it really is true that you know how locals and states can learn together is really critical and last but not least you may have heard in California that we decided in the words of Governor Jerry Brown to launch our own dam satellite. It's actually a network of small satellites there's new technology that will allow us to do methane detection and in this case mitigation to be able to identify where leaks are happening on a global basis. We believe there's potentially $10 billion in economic savings from methane detection California through our resources board will also be the way the deal works with the company planet that we're doing it with. They'll launch the satellites will get free methane data and then build a data consortium with other nonprofits countries and potentially even with oil companies who would have an interest in knowing where they're leaking product at the same time as we encourage them to find another business model. Anyhow it's pretty cool and smart stuff if you're interested in more there's a great article in the L.I. Times by George Skelton to check that out. In terms of looking ahead and happy to take questions on that but I wanted to highlight a few things first of all you know obviously a big fingers cross on the 2018 election and the 2020 election that we can elect more climate leaders and fewer deniers as we move forward. But I did want to point out as Al Gore was on fire during the summit and I think this is 17 appearances. He pointed out way more definitely than I'm about to that the next president in 2020 should they choose to do so will have 30 days from their inauguration to get back into Paris. And so while we're out we're not really out yet. And so it really underscores I think how we can continue the urgency and action to implement from the bottom up in the interim period. And I think that remember continues to be really the the big game on sort of the strategic frame. Let me make a couple points that may be a little bit controversial about I think how we're viewing action forward. So we have the recent IPCC report which for those of you who are urgent on this issue have probably made you more urgent on this issue particularly those of us that have children. And I think the question comes how we can act with both urgency and steely eyed discipline to actually make the numbers and believe in the model that we're doing and the great work of the panelists that you're going to hear from that both the business model and the political change model I think has to be one driven by outcomes. You know that there's a failure to getting excited. Oh are we going to rush forward and pass a cap and trade law in 2021. Well you know we saw what happened in 2009. We got fingers crossed that a moonshot clean energy initiative will pass in California excuse me in Washington which is a blue state and I think it's very important that is a terrible analogy. But if you think of the North Vietnamese in the 1950s 60s and 70s digging tunnels and sticking to a strategy that they believe was the winning strategy. I don't know exactly. First of all we'd welcome a new analogy. But in terms of what's the best way to think about that I've got a different example which is you know call this the outcomes curve. I think we've all seen the stock market hockey stick curve when things take off. But if you think in terms of outcomes the business writer Charles Handy talks about the zone of paradox when old business models are giving way to new business models. And we're obviously in a time now where whether it's a carbon to a decarbonized economy particularly in the U.S. broken politics. It's very hard to stay disciplined that bottom up implementation new business and community partnerships working at the local and state level where really much of the action is at the PUC level etc. To stick to your guns and know that it's going to hockey stick over time when we have 12 years or we're screwed kind of mentality is out there and understandably so. So I just you know at some level if you believe in what we're doing and if you believe in the momentum that will grow over time and doing it I would urge you to do that. With that strategic caution in mind let me just highlight quickly a few areas where businesses states and local leaders can drive further momentum moving forward. One I think is the economic frame the competitiveness frame the business voice which many of you are leading on in this room. It's not always successful it's easy in California to talk about climate and talk about climate morale and all that kind of stuff for the places that we need to move from 40% to 60% of the U.S. population. That business frame is incredibly important I can share with with the group and to sign ups there was a bicameral letter that was done by members of the House and Senate in support of the summit that I think was just fantastically well written messaging about why this is important and why we need to continue. However the election turns out and the other thing I would point out quickly is in this Congress if you're familiar with 45 Q $50 a ton for carbon removal if you're familiar with how additional research dollars were passed for energy and R&D. There's a quiet coalition in Congress including Republicans that are working on an outcomes basis as opposed to a rhetoric basis to get some stuff done and I think what happened in 2018 I think is instructive to some of the opportunities we have moving forward. What are those so one I think RPS increases is a no brainer stable policy works RPS is work and I think we're going to see more of that happen. Carbon reduction for those of you there's a new you know a number of groups EDF WR and others are basically looking at the problem by 2100. You know we're going to have to take 15% of carbon out of the atmosphere or also screwed and there are new technologies direct air capture etc that can benefit from 45 Q. And I think looking at how we're going to tackle that it beyond just tree planning and working lands work is it is a critical opportunity. I think the politics on a bipartisan basis are really key. U.S. Climate Alliance is putting together a bunch of materials and playbooks for the new governors that we're going to have so we're going to have a ton of new governors after this election. Blue states purple states red states we're very interested in bringing to them the technical assistance and value proposition in the U.S. Climate Alliance. But for those of you that you know the next governor of Missouri or wherever somewhere that you guys have particular connection would definitely like to work with you to put in the hands of policy directors. Various playbooks and help for them to get on the ground moving quickly in the way that we help New Jersey when the new governor came in last year. Was talking with Laura earlier around resilience resilience and adaptation has not always been a popular talk topic among mitigation folk. But the reality is the effects are upon us. More importantly if we don't get resilience right will have less money to spend on mitigation. And there's a clear playbook around pre disaster mitigation. There are some interesting ideas around innovative federalism and energy race to the top that I think we can pass to support additional resilience work. And I like to tell a story of the you know the BP headquarters in Houston was a platinum lead building but their power source was in the basement and they couldn't open it for two months. So we got to blend mitigation and lead and resilience together. Fourth area I think is really important is procurement both on the government side on the private sector side we buy the low cost capital bid we don't really look at how we maintain assets meant to 30 and 40 years. So both on the private public side there's a playbook of activities I think are really super important. And on the private side the renewable energy buyers alliance is about to roll out which I think will bring together a lot of businesses and power buyers to really bring additional workforce. So that's the roundup there will be lots more around naming and shaming and leadership on the business side so thank you. Thanks so much Dan for that whole roundup and as he said you know afterwards you know please do feel free to ask him lots of questions or get those questions to us so that we can make sure to get them answered. And as Dan also indicated there is so much hard work ahead that does have to be the the nerdy kinds of stuff and involving people of all kinds at all levels in the private sector in different levels of government across the globe. And for there to be a certain amount of healthy competition in terms of thinking about innovation to really make things better for everybody is going to be terribly important. So it's exciting but it's also as you said urgent and and demanding of what's really needed and somebody who is dealing with this very firsthand in terms of his own country. And in the role that he is playing as an international leader is our next speaker and that is Ambassador Salomara. We are very privileged that he is able to join us today. He is Fiji's ambassador to the United States and to Mexico as well as High Commissioner to Canada. You should be handling our NAFTA. Prior to his current appointments he was Fiji's High Commissioner to the Court of St. James in the UK where he also served as ambassador to Denmark, Germany, the Holy See, Ireland and also Israel. So talking about somebody who has had to balance all sorts of portfolios as a diplomat and and he has done much more there as diplomatically as well as serving in very senior positions in the Fiji government. And I think one of the things that is also extremely important in terms of coming from Fiji and looking at the situations that confront that important island nation. He sees firsthand in terms of the threat of climate and also the the importance of how we address things because of what it means to people to cultures to history everywhere. And Ambassador Salomara has been the co-chair with Germany in terms of past the past Conference of Parties for the Paris Climate Agreement and and therefore was able to bring forward a new kind of partnership and relationship in terms of the dialogue. Kind of unique to a Fiji approach. And so we are privileged Mr. Ambassador to have you with us. Thank you very much Carol for that introduction and then for your summary of the summit and what it tends to do. My role today is to offer a brief overview of how the small island developing states like Fiji and its participation at the summit view the engagement. And what we consider to be a very successful partnership that was developed with the private sector state governments and non government agencies. And all these activists together helped us in in highlighting the importance of of working together to resolve this issue that is confronting us. And I think one of the important message that Fiji is carrying along in its COP 23 presidency is that government alone cannot deal with this issue. But first I wish to briefly highlight the IPCC report that came out this last Monday because it paints a far more calamitous picture of the immediate consequences of climate change than previously thought. And the report says that avoiding the damage requires transforming the world economy at a speed and scale that and I quote no documented historic precedent. The report describes the world of worsening food shortages and wildfires and mass die off of coral reefs as soon as 2040 a period well within the lifetime of much of the global population. The authors also found that if greenhouse gas emissions continue at the current rate, the atmosphere will warm up by as much as 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit or 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by 2040 in undating coastlines and intensifying droughts and poverty. Previous work had focused on estimating the damage if average temperatures were to rise by a larger number 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit or 2 degrees Celsius because that was the threshold scientists previously considered for the most severe effects of climate change. This new report however shows that many of those effects will come much sooner at the 2.7 Fahrenheit degree mark and avoiding the most serious damage requires transforming the world economy within just a few years. And it is estimated that the cost would come around some 50 trillion dollars and more. But while they conclude that it is technically possible to achieve the rapid changes required to avoid the 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit or 1.5 degrees Celsius warming, they concede that it may be politically unlikely. I fear that far too many still underestimate the peril we are in due to global warming. We underestimate it in part because it's too uncomfortable or politically inconvenient to acknowledge the nature and the scale of the risk. However recent weather events here in the United States, in Asia and elsewhere should leave no one in doubt. We have entered a frightening new era and this is at just one degree of warming above the pre-industrial age. Our existing NDCs or nationally determined contribution have us on a path to warming of at least 3 degrees by the end of the century. This according to the IPCC report spells catastrophe, not just for island countries like Fiji, which are currently on the front lines, but all of us. While it seems we must wait for more of the world to wake up to this simple fact, we certainly cannot afford to wait to take action at home. That is why in the last few years Fiji and other small island developing states with the help of forward-looking partners have launched a number of groundbreaking initiatives to stand up to this threat and build the resilience of our infrastructure, communities and natural environment. For example we have partnered with the World Bank to conduct the first climate vulnerability assessment of its kind, which is now helping us plan how to move forward in a smart deliberate fashion. Last year we launched the first sovereign green bond for a developing country to fund both mitigation and adaptation projects and earlier this year we listed it on the London Stock Exchange. We are taking a leading role in exploring ways to expand renewable energy to isolated communities. We are also developing insurance products tailor made for small islands and vulnerable countries. And we are beginning to consider some of the legal complexities that will arise as more and more people are displaced or made homeless by climate change. But as we take action at the national level, Fiji is also proud to do what we can to lead at the global level. As you know this is the year of the Talanoa dialogue in the Fiji's COP presidency, which is based on the concept of an open, honest and respectful process of dialogue used in communities in Fiji and other Pacific Island countries. The idea of Talanoa is to move the world beyond debates and zero-sum negotiations in order to bring the best ideas to the surface and share them. All in an effort to give political leaders the inspiration, the tools and the partnership they need to prepare for more ambitious emission reduction targets by 2020. One of the greatest examples of the power of the Talanoa dialogue was the Global Climate Action Summit hosted by Governor Jerry Brown last month. Investors, cities, states, civil society groups and others showed us the groundswell of climate action that is taking place around the world. They showed us how some of the brightest minds have turned their attention to developing the technology and solutions to help us face this crisis. And most importantly, they showed us a number of ways that countries can harness all this progress and put it to use to strengthen climate ambition at the national level. This is the task before us. As government representatives and leaders, we are expected to search for ways within our means and resources to strengthen our NDCs resolutely upward by 2020. The Talanoa dialogue at COP 24 at the end of the year is an important milestone on this path and Fiji fully expect that it will provide the catalyst needed to help us get there. But do not think that small island countries like Fiji is asking the world to do what we are not willing to do ourselves. While we have contributed very little to the warming of the planet and which is threatening us, we are determined to lead by example. My prime minister last month committed Fiji to delivering and enhance NDC by engaging all sectors of the economy to prepare a long-term decarbonization strategy for net zero emissions by 2050, which will be launched at COP 24 in Poland at the end of the year. This process of broad consultation will inform the preparation of our new NDC, including examining strengthened reduction targets from our transport, maritime, agriculture and forestry sectors. This of course is in addition to our existing commitment to produce 100% of our energy from renewable sources by 2030. As other small island developing states' leaders like the president of the Marshall Islands, which launched its own 2050 net zero strategy last month, President Hine has said and I quote, If we, the small island developing states, can do it, so can you. And this is the challenge that they pose to other developed economies. Frankly, there is no acceptable excuse not to. It is the only way we can keep warming to within 1.5 degrees this century. I said at the outset that I feared that too many people continue to underestimate the challenge ahead of us. But let us not also underestimate our collective ability to solve the problem. Exponential technological change is already happening, which can be a game changer. And this we have learned from the Talanoa dialogue, like the Global Climate Action Summit, that governments need to catch up with the private sectors and regional and provincial governments and community activists who are proactive already in doing the needful on the drought. We recognize as governments that we have the ability to change our energy systems, to draw down carbon in our forests, mangroves and soils, and to make more efficient use of our natural resources. But in the end, it's up to us to make sure we don't fall short of our potential. Thank you. Thank you very much, Ambassador. I must say that there are so many things there that you said that I think are really important for all of us to follow up on. Obviously, the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report, is extremely sobering, and I encourage everyone to really look at that to better understand the kinds of situation that we truly are all confronting together. At this time, I'd like to turn over to our partners, to the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, to Lisa, who will chair our panel of business members. Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Lisa Jacobson. I'm the President of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, and I'm very pleased to be moderating a panel of a very broad set of the subnational actors that participated in the Global Climate Action Summit. So we've got city, state, business, investor interests here, and they're going to give us a view from the ground up. And now that it's been a few weeks since the conference, it's a good time to be checking in with them. And then obviously, you know, so it was already mentioned the last week with the storms that we've experienced just in the last few days, still reeling from Florence, and then the IPCC report coming out. There's a lot of introspection that we need to do, and we're really glad that you're here to participate with us as we're evaluating it and trying to figure out how we can really seize on the important challenges ahead of us. So the Business Council for Sustainable Energy has been a participant from industry as well as the policy side for almost 30 years. But we are certainly, you know, haven't been doing it and don't have as much expertise perhaps as others, but we can give at least a midpoint view on this conversation. And from my standpoint, the findings of the IPCC report were really staggering and probably the strongest message that I've seen about the urgency of action. And so now, as part of the industry coalition that I work with, which represents global companies, but mostly focused on U.S. and North American markets, the energy efficiency, natural gas and renewable energy industries, you know, how are we going to really accelerate even more quickly than we thought we might have had to. So with that, my pleasure to introduce the panel that we have. And I'm so pleased that the Ambassador and Dan Carroll could be with us today, and I think they'll participate in the Q&A portion if that's correct. So next to the Ambassador, we have Elizabeth Beardsley, who is the Senior Policy Council at the U.S. Green Building Council. Next to her is Ann Kelly, Senior Director for Policy in the BISEP network for CERES. Next to her, we have Jack Thiroff, the Senior Vice President and Head of Regulatory Affairs for NL Green Power with the North American focus. And then Tommy down there, Ben is not here yet. I don't see Ben sitting next to you, but we'll introduce, we are expecting very soon. I think he was at a meeting in Annapolis, so Ben Grumbles, who's the Secretary of Maryland's Department of Environment. But at the end, we have Tommy Wells, Director of the Department of Energy and Environment for D.C. So again, a really good showing of the subnational actors that participated in the Global Climate Action Summit. So we actually are in very good time, and we want to make sure that we have at least 20 minutes for discussion. And to just get ready with your questions, because we have an excellent panel here and they can provide a lot of insight to us. But what I've been asked to do as moderator is ask each of our panelists, kind of a very broad question. How did they engage and why did they engage in the Global Climate Action Summit? So I'm going to start, I guess, with Liz and then move our way down. But before I do, I want to acknowledge, you know, the Business Council had a delegation. We did, you know, a lot of work in the lead-up to the Global Climate Action Summit and had excellent participation in our activities and with our members. But it wouldn't have happened without Laura Tierney, who's our Director of International Programs, who's sitting in the front. And she also was instrumental in putting this panel together. So in addition to EESI, I want to thank Laura for all her work to make this happen. So with that, I'm going to turn it to Liz Beardsley. Thank you, Lisa. And first of all, it was a great week, a very full week that exceeded expectations. I want to congratulate Dan and the Governor for a successful event. Yeah. So just to speak a little bit about, you know, there was a lot going on, but my biggest takeaway was the focus on the how. So we've been to lots of climate events in the past where there's a lot of aspiration and maybe sometimes a little fuzziness around the edge. But I felt like this time it really delivered, despite a plethora of new commitments, which are very exciting, there was a lot more how and people were getting into the weeds of policy, of how to bring the private sector, finance and government together in new ways. And I thought that was all very hopeful. And so to highlight a couple things, ways that we engaged. I'm very pleased with C40 and some of the leaders like DC, who's stepping up with both commitments in action. We're especially excited about net zero carbon buildings commitment. And also we held a session with cities ranging from Cincinnati, Oakland, Anchorage and other cities across California and the globe. These are really the doers. So some of the staff that are taking those mayoral commitments and figuring out, OK, how are we going to work towards electrification? How do we coordinate with the grid? How are we kind of making this so that it's feasible and we can still have a strong economy that's equitable? So I think those are really my biggest takeaways. And I think we clearly have much, much more to do. But I feel like we're finally getting to the important conversations of how we're going to make this happen together. Thank you, Liz. Anne. Yeah, thank you, Liz. And I appreciate being here and thanks for putting this together. There's so much to say. My challenge is going to be to be as succinct as I possibly can. My hats off to you, Dan, and the governor's office for what you did and appreciate your remarks. Ambassador Solomara, our responsibility is great. And the burden is hitting you and none of the responsibility. So thanks for reminding us of that. I was pleased that the summit also did what summits often don't do, which was to be highly inclusive of individuals from other parts of the world with different points of view and featuring many of the individuals that, as the ambassador noted, had no responsibility for this problem and are bearing the burden. And we could say that a hundred times and it wouldn't be enough. We have to keep reminding ourselves of that. There were protests. I thought it was really important that my colleague from Anna Pavlova, who couldn't be here today, from Russia, said that it was so heartening to see those protests because she grew up in a place where it would have been much more difficult to challenge the status quo and the government in the way that those protesters were. Whether we believe in what they were saying or not, there was energy and there was a liveliness to the summit that was welcoming, that clearly energized our base. I think the intangible was just how motivated one could feel being there. It was a little bit like being at a cop at a conference of the parties, but it was right here at home in California. And there was a can-do spirit that I think was pretty palpable. And I agree that Al Gore completely headed out of the park. But so did many others. I was primarily there with, we are still in. Perhaps you can see my button here. I usually wear one on the right and the left, but I only had one today. And we are still in, of course, was a meme that became a movement in June of 2019, now has 3,500 signatories, cities, towns, universities, colleges, tribes, businesses, investors, faith groups, most recently musicians, artists are still in. So we're building new pillars all the time in a growing consensus, one which we increasingly are attempting to make bipartisan. We delivered Mayor Brainard from Carmel, Indiana. The Republican mayor stood with the we are still in leader circle on the main stage to once again just pledge that we are still in. And thank you, Dan Carroll for reminding us that in 2020, we'll be back in. So then we're going to change the buttons accordingly. We did an event a full day form. We are still in celebrating all the sectors that I just mentioned and just a couple of highlights in addition to my colleague Anna Pavlova, who was very moving from Schneider Electric. Schneider Electric, by the way, is one of the enablers. There's really going to get this done. Thank you, Liz, for mentioning the how. The other enabler that's going to get this done is on my left here, Enel. I can't wait to hear from Jack. A disruptor. So these are the kind of people we need that are disrupting our vision of what an energy system is supposed to look like, getting rid of the monopoly, working toward distributed energy. You all know that. But the summit was infused with the kind of disruption that we're going to need urgently. And I really compliment the planners for that. It was all about the new paradigms. Our event was featuring the various practical ways in which people are still in. What is still in mean? Highlighting their commitments, highlighting their reach goals, their stretch goals, and doing so in a celebratory way. I want to just highlight Fawn Sharp, who is the president of the Quinault Nation in Washington, and she gave an incredibly impassioned plea to pass Initiative 1631, the carbon pricing initiative that you all know about, which is a vital importance. Many companies announced new science-based targets. There was a goal to have 500. We got to 488. As most of you know, and Dan highlighted, there are lots of good news on the corporate front. But we are still in focused on nurturing the partnerships between the various groups that I just mentioned, and we did that in an all-day event, and then moved on to the summit for the next couple of days, and I'll leave it at that. Well, thank you very much. I want to highlight and echo a few comments we've heard already. One is the focus on the how. That was one of our takeaways from the week in San Francisco. We came to the Global Climate Action Summit kind of wearing two hats. One is as one of the largest U.S. renewable energy developers and owners. So we have more than 100 power plants in the U.S. and Canada, all renewable. About 4.5 gigawatts online today. It should be over 5 gigawatts by the end of the year. We're also part of one of the world's largest electric utilities that's based in Rome, Italy. So our parent company operates electric utilities in Europe and Latin America, and has seen, I think smartly, but from a biased perspective, that the business model is changing, that we are past the moment where traditional approaches are going to work, and so we are all in investing in renewables. We're all in facilitating electric vehicle infrastructure, and there's a moral component to that. There's a need to protect our environment, to look out for future generations. There's also a profit motive, and I think one of the key elements that also came from the week in San Francisco is that businesses are committed here. They're committed, again, for moral reasons. They're also committed because it can work for their bottom line. And that's something that exactly we want to help facilitate and we want to help lead on as we ourselves move away from our fossil units and move towards renewables. And that was one of the elements that we've certainly seen from Paris to today. We have commitments, and I remember from our high school football, some are weightlifting shirts that said, don't tell me, show me. And it's always good to see and hear the commitments from companies, but actually seeing them line up, procure renewable energy, procure it in ways that are increasingly more stringent, more complicated. And creating, from the period from 2015 to today, we're selling here in the U.S. increasingly to corporates, to Anaheiser Bush, to Kohler, to Google, to Facebook. And what we are focused on is keeping up the drumbeat of ambition, of the need to continue moving forward with renewables, with cleaner ways of producing and using energy, but also focusing on the how, making sure that we're focused on the details that let non-utility offtake take place, that let us build a 21st century transmission system so we can get renewables from parts of the country where there's a very strong resource to the population centers, focusing on using all this ambition, using this energy, using this sense of urgency, and focusing it on policy solutions that can help us really get results. And so it was a very heartening week. I was also, we have a long way to go. So in a way, very sobering, but we are excited that we have a chance to remake the policy framework and really change businesses' approach to, again, how we produce and how we use electricity. Thank you very much, and thank you for inviting me. When I think about back on that week, the first thing I think about is I wish all of you could have been there. It's, there's nothing heavier than what we're all trying to do together is contemplating the planet's ability to sustain us. And with the storms that were happening while we were there, Hurricane Florence and a typhoon out on the other part of the world and is what we see right now, that it can be really heavy. I mean, we're all trying to save the planet and it can get depressing. And as there's an accelerating impact that's being predicted actually happening around us, it can get depressing. So we spent a week where it was like a rally. It was a rally with the major players that can make the difference. Not only did we have, you know, rallies from like Al Gore, but with Mayor Bloomberg listing all the commitments and the progress that we're making. It really gave me a sense of that this is possible, that we can make a difference. And then ending it with John Mayer serenading Jane Goodall was probably one of the most profound things I have seen in my lifetime. And it was special. It was special. But Washington, D.C. is a member of C40, C40 is now the 90 largest cities in the world. And cities are acting, making commitments together, driven by Bloomberg and other actors that about 50% of the world's population, as you know, live in cities. 70% of all greenhouse gases are due to the activity of cities. And when we talk about industrialization, it really produced cities. And so in America, 63% of our population lives in cities and within about 20 years, 25 years, 70 plus will live in cities. And that only represents 3.5% of all of our land mass, but it's cities that are causing this. Any time you fly in or over cities at night, you know, from an airplane, you look down and you see the glows. So much of that is the cause of greenhouse gases and that's where it's happening. So Washington, D.C. is trying to keep up and lead. We recognize that we have a very special relationship in Washington being that we house the nation's capital. That after the last presidential election, our mayor went to Mexico City and led a delegation of other mayors from America and said to the rest of the world of mayors that we're still in and that one election doesn't change the values and commitments of our country. And I was very proud of our mayor, but it recognized that the city leadership, I mean, obviously the states are important, but you have examples that you know of where a governor can deny climate change, but the mayor that's up against the coast has to respond and figure out how to keep their residents safe from rising waters. So the mayor has made the pledge that we will be carbon neutral as a city by 2050, that all new buildings by 2030 will be carbon neutral and that we will divert 70% of our waste by 2030, 2032, and to get to 100% by 2050 at least. But these pledges are having to accelerate and as we make these pledges, we are constantly trying to figure out, well, how are we going to do that? And so I really do believe that the week in San Francisco continues to support putting us with our private partners and with other jurisdictions that are trying to figure this all out. We, you know, it is the proverbial repairing the airplane while you're flying it and that's what we're doing. And so another, you know, through C-40 through these relationships, next week I'm taking a delegation of developers, contractors, and financiers from D.C. to Copenhagen to meet with their counterparts there to talk about district energy and then to Brussels to talk about passive house standards. That's the kind of partnerships that we're creating through C-40 and through these gatherings to learn best practices from each other as fast as we can and then convincing the folks that have, you know, that pay the money to build the buildings and do this, convincing them that it's possible that we can do it. So that's my takeaway was that it was a great rally. I wish every one of you could have been there. And it did lift my spirits that we can do this. Well, thank you. Excellent. Opening, yes, please. Opening comments. I do not see Secretary Grumbel's here yet, but if he does arrive, we will of course give him the microphone. But I, you know, a lot of emphasis on the how and I think one comment I would make, you know, which also will relate to my question for all of you is the role of policy in the how. But when I think back on, you know, 2015 and the Paris Agreement and the road to Paris, whether we've had political change or not, we would need to do all the things that you're talking about at the pace that we now need to do them. So on one hand, you know, we've had some, you know, changes in our federal policy landscape, but it doesn't make what you're doing any less important or any less urgent. And so if our positions on the Paris Agreement were to change over time, it won't change what you're doing and the impact of what you're doing. And now the question is, as you said, how do we get to the how and get to the how faster? So what is the role of policy in the how? And obviously we're here in Washington and we're talking probably to many congressional staffers or others that engage in federal policy, but you don't need to limit it to federal policy, but if you could speak to how policy can help contribute to getting the job done and getting the job done faster and more cost-effectively, I'd appreciate it. And I'm going to let the entire panel comment. Dan, you're right next to me. So please take a moment and we'll go all the way down. Thank you. Thanks. Well, I'm going to give a commercial for, call it, innovative federalism. So we, it's really hard with complicated systems, whether it's healthcare or energy or infrastructure and to come up with sort of one size fits all solution. So I'm a big believer in, there's a handshake and I think it's very bipartisan around flexibility and accountability. So there's declining federal dollars flowing to states and declining state dollars flowing to locals. And so whether you want to look at energy innovation, resilience, community-based healthcare go across the board, the reality is there are local state partnerships and models that are out there, but in most cases, the challenge that North Carolina faces in terms of dams and levees and floods versus urban energy efficiency versus wildfire, et cetera, there are different challenges and there's only so much money. So I think the idea of, and we've seen some examples of it, I won't burden you with that, but I think there's an opportunity rather than trying to pass a national climate bill or climate pricing bill in any Congress I could imagine in the next several years just given the margins, there is a ton of opportunity to be able to say, hey cities, hey states, we're going to give you performance-based money, you tackle the problem that you want, we'll link it to performance and we'll learn and scale from there. So innovative federalism meets climate outcomes, maybe not messaged around climate, maybe messaged more around other stuff, I think has a lot of there there. Thank you, Ambassador, please. Yes, I believe the short answer would be from the national level and when you're engaging with political leaders, it's how to convince them that the cost of inaction is way more than the political cost to their own career or to the success of their governments in power. Because as we had already highlighted that, we are going to experience this devastating impact of climate change in our lifetime. We are not talking about the next generation and that is, in my opinion, the challenge before us in engaging our political leaders is how do we engage them to realize that it will cost more to them and to the country if we delay action on this issue. Thanks for the question, Lisa. I think looking at the federal role and thanks to all of you for being here, I can say two main buckets. First of all, it's really important that the federal apparatus continue and expand the core programs that help enable private sector and sub-nationals in pursuing programs that address climate and try to mitigate more significantly what's going on. These are the range work by Department of Energy, EIA, the National Labs, EIA, some basic data that we need to build programs off of and to enable some of the interesting activity, Energy Star, data access and support for building codes. These might sound kind of nerdy, but they really do provide a basis for a lot of other things that are happening. Secondly, to really use the spending power to its maximum potential here. So to accelerate activity, whether that's with grids, trying to pride some of the states that haven't maybe taken some basic policy steps. There's states without energy codes, for example. And really any public funding of infrastructure or construction should have some minimum performance requirements. So these are some of the tangible steps that I think the federal government can do and should do. Thanks, Liz. I'm reminded of former Secretary of State, John Kerry, who said that law is usually the latecomer. It's the latecomer because it's a product of consensus that's already there, and it just takes a while for it to get in place. And I feel like in this area, there's just a vast consensus about what we need to do if you look at any of the data from Yale and the climate communications folks. So what I often hear from highly regulated industries and incumbent industries that have benefited so far from the status quo is, you know, we don't really need rules and regulations. We can do this voluntarily. We can actually do this. We can do the right thing because we really want to tackle this problem. Experience would suggest otherwise. You know, we've now had 50 years of data of our environmental law infrastructure that's been effective because it's been in rules and regulations without the Clean Air Act in 1970, strengthened by the 1990 amendments, and all of the implications and all the regulations and permits and limits, and the necessary constraint that a law can provide, which then spurs innovation. So constraint spurs innovation, and a law can play that role. Without that, we wouldn't have the Clean Air that we have today. So there's, in this particular area, there's plenty of data that we need good rules, but we also need rules that encourage free markets and competition. Right now, there are rules in place that are creating monopolies, and as you all know, we need a diversified energy grid, a smart modernized grid. We need energy choice. And on that, our colleagues with the Conservative Clean Energy Network are in robust agreement at the state level, just because we're at the federal level, and it's been a tough couple of weeks in Washington. My heart goes out to all of you and all of us. I won't kid you. And this administration has been one of profound challenge. There's a lot of innovation in the states, that the states were laboratories of innovation, and I agree with Dan, a big climate bill is probably a long ways off, but there are good things happening at the state level, and I wouldn't ignore those. Thank you. And Secretary Grumbel, welcome. You are here with us. We are just wrapping up a question, and I think what we'll do is we'll let Jack and Tommy comment on that, and we'll move right to you. We were asking them in the remarks that everybody made about the Global Climate Action Summit, there was an emphasis on how practical and focusing on how to get the job done. And so they were just commenting a little bit on the role of policy as it relates to that opportunity. So Jack will go to you, and then Tommy, and then we'll give the floor to Secretary Grumbel. Thanks, Lisa. I'd reiterate the point of there being a very diverse collection of policies at the state level, and what can work for decarbonization or for modernizing electricity infrastructure in one place can be totally different from another. And I think if you look at the wind and solar industries, where they've grown in the U.S., where they've been deployed, it isn't necessarily places that have a high price on CO2. And so there are many ways to come at, build out of clean energy. For us, there's no silver bullet. It would be great if we could suggest what the policy would be everywhere. That's obviously not the case. And at the federal level, some things that are not going to completely transform the world and they can be passed and everyone can go home and say we solved our energy and environmental challenges, but they can make an incremental improvement. And these are things that are encouraging transmission build-outs, promoting R&D, helping deploy battery storage both behind the meter and from the meter. There are elements that we had thought of as part of a potential infrastructure bill, and without commenting on the likelihood of something like that coming together. There are policy concepts that are ready that can help deploy technologies that can help address a range of issues from resilience to environmental priorities, and that we should focus on the big and the small. Another analogy is it's hard to hit a curveball. It's easy to run hard to first. Let's focus on the things that are doable and something that I think our industries can do and that the BCSE, in particular, has done a really good job with the fact book that has come out every year for the past four or five years, is just helping educate and remind people that there are low-carbon technologies that are extremely affordable, that are the lowest price that you can get for new electricity. It can beat out even existing electricity based of where you are in the country. And that's something that I think for those of us who live it every day and who are competing against each other to shave a cent here and there and try to win a contract, we know. I don't think we've done a very good job of making it as clear as possible that renewables are affordable and that that is a product of customer choice but also a product of technology that hinges on policy but also operates independently and it's certainly the case in the U.S. It's also the case in Canada, in Mexico, in many markets where we're working and I think that it can help with the enthusiasm or the sense of difficulty in moving towards zero-carbon is that it doesn't have to be a choice between economic growth and low-cost energy and moving towards renewables. Increasingly, renewables are the low-cost choice and it would probably help us to say that over and over as much as we can in as many places as we can. So first, let me acknowledge that I left an interesting meeting this morning that was being cheered by Ben Grumbles with seven states around the table trying to agree on how they're going to clean up the Chesapeake Bay together and it was a little unruly and I was glad to leave. And so it's nice to see that you made it, Ben, and you don't look any worse for the wear. So on the role of policy, let me say that, you know, the leadership sets the goals, people agree on the goals, and then every jurisdiction has to have a plan. For D.C., it's the Clean Energy D.C. plan. That's the roadmap of how we're going to get to the goals. It's organic, it's going to continue to have to have input and change as technology changes, as prices change, as all that happens. So you have the plan. And then, as you implement, that's when it really does come into laws and regulations. I think that Ann Kelly was exactly right, that the greatest goals we've made is when it's been required, when there's requirements. And that, I know in D.C., our biggest, you know, cause of greenhouse gases are building, 74% of our greenhouse gases caused by our buildings. And so we've got pace financing. We have a bunch of money going into solar that's spent locally. We have a sustainable energy utility of 20 million a year, which for the size of our city is great. And we have these other incentives, but all these carrots and, you know, power is pretty cheap. A lot of folks in D.C. just, well, we'll get to that. And we've been doing benchmarking of our buildings for about six years now, and for the past three years, if you don't send your scores in, you'll be fine. And so our, we've got some good data. So there's a bill in front of the council that I helped the council work on to create the stick, and that's the Building Energy Performance Standards that we start looking at, you're going to have to perform at a certain level, or they'll be fine. But meanwhile, we're also creating a green bank to go with all the other things to help fund this. And I'm very aware of the social equity issues. Our lowest performing buildings have had the margins to invest in retrofitting their whole building without raising rates. So our job is on the policy levels as we create the green bank that they get the funding, financing, you know, the energy audits, things that they need to show that what their payback is, we give them the capital up front, but that's the partnership, but it's all built around policy, and it's all built around the requirements and laws. Thank you. So I'm glad that you could be with us. Do you want to make your comments from there, or do you want to come up to the podium to make a few comments? Whatever is most comfortable for you. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. So I'm Ben Grumbles, and I'm the environment secretary from Maryland, and I work for Governor Larry Hogan, and I can't begin to tell you how empowering and impressive it was for me on behalf of Governor Hogan to be part of the Global Climate Action Summit and focus on science-based policy-driven goals and actions to reduce greenhouse gases and to increase resiliency and preparedness and as the environment secretary from Maryland and as the chairman for the Nine-State Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, I delivered a few messages while out in San Francisco at the Global Climate Action Summit, and one of them is on behalf of Reggie, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, I would say it's the greatest story rarely told over the last two years. Five Republican governors, and New England, Northeast, and the Mid-Atlantic all agreeing to not only continue, but to strengthen at least through 2030 the cap-and-trade program, and Reggie is the nation's first mandatory cap-and-invest program, and over the last 10 years it just celebrated its 10th anniversary, it has generated $3 billion in revenues for the states to reinvest in energy efficiency, renewables, rate-payer relief, it has economic and public health benefits and sends a powerful message around the country and around the world that states are united in a bipartisan basis to move for cleaner and greener and healthier. The other only other point I'd make just in the interest of time as the environment secretary the importance of bi-coastal bi-partisan urgent and impactful actions between the public sector and the private sector is needed now more than ever, and our state is absolutely committed to meeting our aggressive 40 by 30 goal which was established through the commission that I chair in the state a diverse body of interest public and private and affirmed by the legislature and probably signed by the governor and we know that that's not the end of it that we need to continue to move towards an 80% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2050 and we need to be taking important steps to transition and focus not just on the energy sector but increasingly on the transportation sector and so Maryland two things that Maryland is proudly doing and we have an action summit was one working with agriculture on our healthy soils initiative very important effort to increase productivity and resiliency while reducing greenhouse gases in the agricultural sector and the other one is the first of its kind state supported climate leadership academy which our state is launching right now providing instruction technical assistance to local governments to nonprofits to the private sector on various aspects of how to reduce greenhouse gases how to increase efficiency in the building sector in local government how to increase resiliency not just against sea level rise but urban heat island effect Tommy Wells is a great leader throughout the region and the country on reducing that urban heat island effect through green infrastructure and creative regulation so incentives and pricing as well as regulations can help drive policy and I'm just glad to be catching the tail end of this important discussion on what was a very impactful and enthusiastic summit thanks so we have a good 15 minutes for questions I'm thrilled about that so yes and I will ask everyone please keep your questions very brief and keep it to a question and please introduce yourself so this gentleman here and then this young woman right there I'm Dr. Sam Hancock of Emeril Planet Emeril Planet TV it's great being here and thank you for all the speakers Tommy good to see you as always but we're seeing how a lot of this activity and action is coming from the local areas county, city, states even regional bodies as the Terry was talking about right now so going across the whole group including our honorable ambassador from Fiji which is one of my favorite countries is how do we leverage that and let people know that because we're international with our Emeril Planet TV and we keep getting asked what's happening in Washington what's happening in Washington I see you have to look at the United States and the local governments to know what's really going on so how do we get that message out there that a lot is going on and many good things and thank you for being here if you'd like to start any questions or any reactions on how we can get the message out thank you for the question I understand it's often a huge challenge trying to get the good message out in this environment of so many discouraging news but I suppose you know like it's the responsibilities on all parties you know like governments the private sector even at the community levels when we before we came to the summit in California the Fiji delegation went to the state parties conference in Bangkok and there was a lot of concern that governments might not meet the goals of the COP23 and that is the finalization of the rule book at the COP24 in Poland but then we came to California and we were really encouraged by the enthusiasm and the developments the positive developments that are happening on the ground and there was also agreement that these positive developments that are happening all over the world needs to be told and retold and brought to international conferences and it was in that light that all the leaders particularly from the small island developing states and those from the Pacific Island region when they took the floor at the United Nations General Assembly this past September they highlighted the encouraging news that was coming out of California and the need for governments to listen to the private sector and other stakeholders and also to realize that there's a huge movement that's happening at the national and community level that political leaders need to pay attention to that I'll take maybe one or two more comments and we'll go to the next question anyone else? I love your question because you're a TV guy so you need visuals and I'd love to deliver you several I think you're asking the right question and what Ben described is of vital importance in terms of Reggie but I honestly would have a hard time getting you a good visual of a mandatory cap and trade system but what I'm telling for a visual would be the fact that the coal museum in Kentucky was covered with solar panels that's a game changing kind of move the Falcon Stadium in Atlanta is also covered with solar panels and not always known and the Green Sports Alliance would be happy to tell you about that I think those images where wind farms actually are lovely tourist attractions and make a beautiful noise and they're not a bad thing and there are many many visuals otherwise we're not producing in a profitable way I love the idea of talking about healthy soils as well which Ben brought up and getting some great visuals on what healthy soils mean that's a real bipartisan agreement on healthy soils not regenerative agriculture that's too complicated a word but it's all about healthy soils so I'd love to give you a list of visuals and finally I had a meeting this morning with a particular electric car company I'm introducing them to NASCAR because those are the real race cars of the day obviously that's another good visual the other thing I mean making a lot of little things seem big is exactly right you gotta believe as I was talking before it's a strategy you just need to believe in I think storytelling and visuals are key I'll throw out one other thing I think is important is getting whether it's state legislators or city council members or federal members of congress to realize that their power of convening and coming out to their district and highlighting success stories and then creating them is just as important in many cases a metric as co-writing the bill that doesn't become a law and they are so welcome in their district so I think getting members legislators to see a different metric for their role to support this is key I'm just going to highlight another aspect of it we didn't really talk about the and alluded to some of the economic benefits of the transformation to low and zero carbon economies we now have over 2.3 million jobs in the United States that are supported by energy efficiency, renewable energy and other clean energy sources and we have case studies and profiles of individuals and of communities that have benefited from it and there are many different places you can go but I will I'll highlight one through a partner organization of the business council for sustainable energy the clean energy business network they've done profiles on clean energy workers called faces of the facts which stems from the fact book the sustainable energy in America fact book that the organization produces each year so I mean that's just one I mean there are many organizations that are profiling jobs and economic benefits so in addition to all the things that we have to do because of the negative impacts there are a lot of economic opportunity and upsides from this and we can give very clear and real people to translate that to the public and to politicians who also like to talk about economic opportunity and jobs in their jurisdictions so we had another question yeah thank you so much for everyone being here your insights from the Paris summit are incredibly insightful I'm Rachel Minor from the Senate I have a question regarding the how and also changing the consensus of nuclear energy right now the DOD is kind of leading the nuclear front both for climate change and for security but unfortunately nuclear energy is associated with spills leakage problems and also terrorism how can we change that consensus and what solutions did you see from the Paris climate I can give a perspective on nuclear it's not gonna directly answer your question for us in our investment decisions in the US globally the concerns you've raised about the perception of nuclear to decide one thing that we this is helpful to this perspective how a private company comes at it all the products that we're doing in the world we want to try to have a 3 year turnaround on because one thing that we don't control and that we're seeing is increasing is unpredictability in the world and commodity markets and so one of the great things about renewable energy is one 2 gigawatt project we're doing 2100 megawatt projects and if there's an issue with one you're able to adapt to another and also if you have a turnaround from investment start construction to operations that you're measuring in months and not a decade or more you know what the world's gonna look like you know it's very difficult to predict what electricity prices are gonna be what electricity demand's gonna be in 10 years out and that's another reason when we look at nuclear it's a challenge for those reasons so from the broader climate perspective I think you're absolutely right that nuclear has a role to play that's the view for us here that I think is not more kind of commercially focused as opposed to the broader perception I agree is very much in the media I don't know if that's that may be a frustrating answer and I have to say from going from COP 21 to today I am completely convinced we cannot do this without nuclear power and we have an aging power fleet we don't know whether to mothball it or phase them out or not as a transition power at least for the eastern seaboard in the northern middle Atlantic that we cannot go carbon free as fast as we want to without a transition power of nuclear so I have been vocal on this from my generation there's a lot of bad connotations around nuclear I helped negotiate the excellent PEPCO deal and the main opposition in DC was nuclear but the fact is DC gets about 30% of its power from nuclear if we bring on renewables as fast as we can but let the and then denuclearize or whatever the you know unnuke at the same time we're going to go to gas and coal it's just a fact we cannot have a transition this is true in every developed country and developing country but mostly developed countries throughout Europe Germany's finding this other countries are finding this we can't do it without nuclear especially we just don't have enough hydro power we don't have enough you know windmills on the coast out yet maybe we will in 15 or 20 years but we don't have 15 to 20 years and so it's going to cost more to keep nuclear going and it's going to we're going to have to look at how to do it we're going to need on policies to support it but we cannot decarbonize without nuclear I just wanted to add that in Maryland a very important component of our energy portfolio is Calvert Cliff's nuclear power plant and I think other states that are part of Reggie and other states around the country the nuclear component is such a critical part of clean air but nobody should diminish or downplay the risks that are associated with nuclear but I think the discussion about clean energy or clean electricity standards is a really important one that we all need to be having over the coming year or two and just to say to Ann who made the comment about the lack of visuals for Reggie we have not met our charismatic megafauna mascot one last thing on nuclear and I'll say that I'm speaking personally here obviously much broader topic to make for its own panel but in terms of building Jack's point about practical deployment times let me add sort of practical politics if the smaller advanced nuclear reactors you know if you want to move the politics on it there's something called the 1952 Price Anderson Act which puts essentially the taxpayers on the hook for the cost of accidents so if the industry believes in its technology that much I think their opening bid would be we don't need price Anderson support okay now we got a lot of questions so we only have five minutes so I think I want to do very rapid fire just give your questions and we'll see how many answers we can get some one two and three just very quick introduce yourself and ask your question and then I'll go to the panel once all three are asked hi everyone Patrick from the House of Representatives with the current trend of social sorry supply chain sustainability and looking at B2B sourcing in the private sector I was wondering if the public sector entities could comment on how you guys are tackling supply chain sustainability or if you are at all or just your general view on that hi my name is Danny Huff I'm also at the House of Representatives I have a little bit of a thought experiment rather than a question so while the federal government doesn't do anything on climate change you mentioned that subnational state and local governments are doing things some are doing a lot like California some are doing nothing and so on the one hand that's a great thing for someone particularly in this administration the state and the local are acting but on the other hand I kind of worry or wonder whether that poses a unique policy problem for federal policy makers when we ultimately get to the point where we're making federal policy because there are some states that are going to be rewarded for how much they've done some states that will want it to be measured based on how much they admit some states that don't want to move at all and so I wonder if you think that this tapestry of state and local policies you know some good some not so good is going to pose as a challenge when we ultimately do create federal legislation excellent question in the back very quickly your question thanks hi I'm Rachel Carillo I'm a writer and a climate activist and a member with the United Nations Association out of Colorado and my question is for everyone but it's mostly directed to the to his excellency the ambassador from Fiji we have 68 and a half million people who are currently displaced in the world 17 million are and rising are refugees and among them climate refugees from Syria internally and domestically now we've got people from Florence and Hurricane Harvey and now Hurricane Michael who've been displaced so my question is how can we learn from small island developing states like Fiji how to respond and be prepared as Americans to climate displacement which is ongoing current day and I recognize that the island nation of Kiribati has a partnership with the island of Fiji and if something happens with their island and then moving people to your islands thank you well maybe we'll start with that ambassador and then we had the supply chain question at the public level and then we had the question about how to develop federal policy given the patchwork of state and local policies well thank you for the question because the movement of people the displacement of people due to climate change is a very real issue that we are facing in the Pacific Islands in my talk we are also you know like looking deeply into the legal implication of countries that go under and what will their status be but to answer directly to your question on how should we respond in the Fijian context our leaders our political leaders have viewed the displacement of people due to climate change as a humanitarian issue and that is the reason why we have taken the step of offering a refuge for the people of Kiribati and the people of Tuvalu and other neighboring countries to move to Fiji in the event that the their islands are threatened by seawater and you know like if they are if they go under you know like when the sea level rise and with so much negative reporting on immigration and movement of people it is such a big issue but for Fiji we are fortunate because we have lived with many different races for a number of years yes we have our own internal issues with it but our leaders feel that we can well address these issues you know like internally while at the same time offering refuge for people who may need so the next question was about public sector supply chain procurement type issues do you want to answer that Dan and then we will I am happy to share more with you I think the by clean legislation and both voluntary and other procurement changes there is a bunch of stuff around resiliency and there is a whole field in terms of the public sectors poor asset management of the facilities we own so there is a performance playbook on that and to your question you know I think some version of innovative federalism you have a policy goal you want to give base level support to locals or states to get up to speed I think there maybe can be a performance layer for innovators to learn more and then speaking for the state of California things like autos we don't want to be if we are succeeding on something we just don't want to be stopped so on supply chain LA has led an initiative with other cities that will join them across the country to green our fleets with EVs so that bargaining down the cost of say the Chevy Bolt if we all buy Chevy Bolts and hopefully the production will be better than Tesla has been but on the supply chain we have done this before with street cars we are doing it now across the country with trying to again have EVs in our government fleets we certainly I think all of us at different levels can do better get finer grained of how we do purchasing it fits and starts and it's not uniform through the district of Columbia and we are working on that but that is certainly an area of growth for us. I would on the state leadership possibly making it more difficult for policy leadership every state that I work with makes it clear that as they are taking proactive steps for climate that there is a very important role for the federal government and so for instance in Maryland as we take steps to reduce the carbon footprint in the transportation sector we are also pushing back really hard on roll backs at the federal level so you have to have a two prong message one of we can do this in our our lane our space but we also need federal leadership with that I think we are going to close I want to thank all of you I want to thank our panel and I also want to thank EESI for the excellent leadership in the series of events they do on many important energy and environmental topics so let's give the panel a hand and also the audience and I just very quickly wanted to say before you all leave to add our thanks to everyone to the ambassador to Dan to our whole panel but also the issue about jobs came up so outside on the table there is a briefing notice we are doing a briefing on October 25th all about jobs and what is going on in the energy sector and there will be state by state information as well it's another place and it's another way to get some visuals ok see thanks