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Here you'll find events happening in the climate and energy space, and below are summaries of the day's biggest stories, followed by a fairly comprehensive list of today's climate and energy news and opinions, and finally the Denier Roundup. 

New Initiative Challenges Funders To Up Environmental Justice Philanthropy: A new initiative is challenging American climate philanthropies to dramatically increase their funding of environmental efforts led by Black, Indigenous, Latino and other people of color, the AP reports. “People say we have 10 years to solve the climate crisis but people of color are living it right now,” Ashindi Maxton, co-founder of the Donors of Color Network which launched the campaign Thursday, told the AP. “Organizations led by people of color are chronically underfunded and there is a ... vibrant set of leaders and organizations that people can fund.” The historic and present effects of redlining and other systems of (environmental) racism disproportionately burden communities of color with pollution and the impacts of climate change-fueled disasters. A New School study found 12 national environmental funders awarded just 1.3% of their 2016 and 2017 grants in the Gulf and Midwest regions to groups focused on environmental justice, and barely a quarter of the nation's top 40 environmental foundations and grant providers even submitted data on their staff demographics for a Green 2.0 report released last month. The Climate Funders Justice Pledge, launched Thursday, calls on philanthropies to direct 30% of their funding to groups led by people of color within two years of signing up. “Now is where the rubber meets the road and it’s a moment to put your money where your mouth is,” Ana Baptista, who led the New School study, told the AP. (AP)

Judge Blocks MT Coal Mine Expansion Over Climate Change Impacts: A federal judge blocked the expansion of Montana's largest coal mine on Wednesday, ruling the Interior Department failed to account for the social cost of the carbon pollution that would result from the additional coal extracted. The ruling criticized the Trump administration for "ignor[ing] more accurate scientific information when it is available," referring to a 2017 executive order directing agencies not to account for the social cost of carbon. The decision could test the Biden administration's willingness to undo permitting decisions made by the previous administration. On his first day in office, President Biden directed federal agencies to account for the full damages caused by greenhouse gas pollution to human health and the environment. (AP, Montana Free Press, Billings Gazette, Bloomberg Law, KTVQ, Reuters)

New Study Could Establish Liability For Climate Polluters: New research shows global warming caused by human activity is to blame for a shrinking Andean glacier that threatens to flood 120,000 people and could be used to establish legal liability for polluters. The study, published in Nature Geoscience on Thursday by scientists at the University of Oxford and the University of Washington, found human activity caused the vast majority of temperature increases in the region. Those warmer temperatures are turning glacial lakes like Lake Palcacocha, high in the Peruvian Andes, into flooding time bombs. The study is expected to impact a lawsuit brought by Peruvian farmer Saúl Luciano Lliuya against Germany's largest electricity provider RWE for $20,000 to cover the costs of preventing damage from a potential outburst from the lake; an amount based on RWE's proportional contribution to total greenhouse gas pollution. Lliuya and those supporting his lawsuit argue the study supports RWE's contribution to, and thus liability for, the increased risk of glacial flooding. “A number of new lawsuits are attempting to hold high-emission companies responsible for the costs of climate change,” Prof Thom Wetzer, the founding director of the Oxford Sustainable Law Programme, told the Guardian. “It is now up to litigators to translate the science into high-impact legal arguments." (The Guardian, Thomson Reuters Foundation, InsideClimate News, E&E $; Commentary: Forbes, Eric Mack op-ed)

OIL & GAS: Oil companies’ losses in 2020 were staggering. And that was before the government focused on climate change. (Washington Post $), debt-laden oil majors in retreat mode even as crude rallies (Bloomberg $), Chesapeake Energy cuts 15% of workers as it emerges from bankruptcy (Reuters)

OVERSIGHT: Pandemic watchdog is probing Mnuchin, Cruz roles in Fed lending (Bloomberg)

OPINION: Oil companies are facing the moment of truth. The stakes couldn't be higher (CNN, Julia Horowitz analysis), why is the fossil fuel industry trying to kill jobs for its laid-off workers? (Houston Chronicle, Gilbert Metcalf and Amy Myers Jaffe op-ed)

(ENVIRONMENTAL) RACISM: ‘We need to be in the room’: The Green Movement's long overdue racial reckoning (Politico Pro $)

CLIMATE LITIGATION: Paris court finds France guilty of failing to meet its own Paris climate accord commitments (CBS, The Guardian, New York Times $, Reuters)

TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF: Therapy for the end of the world (The Walrus)

AGENCIES: Biden EPA backs deal to close 3 coal-fired power plants (E&E $), Tribes expect a voice on land and waters under Haaland (E&E $)

THE HILL: Biden climate, energy agenda faces early Senate test (E&E $), Cory Booker, Raphael Warnock and Ben Ray Luján join [previously all-white] Senate Ag committee (Modern Farmer), AOC, Sanders, and Blumenauer press Biden to declare a ‘climate emergency’ (Grist, AP, The Hill, E&E $), Democrats seek to block further Arctic drilling (The Hill, E&E $), Senators are still debating whether cutting fossil fuels will save the planet (Grist)

VOTE-A-RAMA: Senate approves Keystone XL, fracking amendments (E&E $), Senate votes to fund schools affected by lost drilling revenue (Politico Pro $)

PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE: Report outlines path for clean energy standard in reconciliation (Politico Pro $, E&E $, Grist, The Hill)

POLITICS: ‘We’ve learned to love the guy:’ how Biden charmed the left (Politico), a former Trump adviser may have revealed what the fossil fuel bonanza was really about (HuffPost), Joe Biden’s plans to combat climate crisis have – predictably – provoked GOP backlash (The Guardian), GOP directs ire for Biden's climate agenda at John Kerry (Washington Post $)

AGENDA: 'A big promise': Biden's climate spending pledge faces early test (Politico Pro $), Biden’s climate adviser leading talks with auto, utility sectors (Bloomberg $)

CLIMATE DIPLOMACY: Canada's Trudeau eyes 'leaps forward' in integration with US on EVs, critical minerals (Reuters), rich countries must update financial vows to tackle climate crisis, says UN (The Guardian), UN chief reappoints billionaire Bloomberg as climate envoy (AP)

CITIES AND STATES: Rebates are key to [Virginia] Democrats’ transportation electrification package. Paying for them is a harder nut to crack. (Virginia Mercury)

IMPACTS: California rains starting later, extending fire season: study (Reuters), climate change seen posing health risks for 12 million people in UK (Thomson Reuters Foundation), California is still thirsty after the recent series of winter storms, rainfall figures show (LA Times $), more at risk of losing homes as climate change outpaces response, Fiji warns (Thomson Reuters Foundation)

JUST TRANSITION: 'We risk a yellow vest movement': why the US clean energy transition must be equitable (Vox), rich in oil and gas but New Mexico searching for a safe transition to renewables (Forbes)

RENEWABLES: How the race for renewable energy is reshaping global politics (FT $), Scotch whisky distilleries to use renewable electricity created by underwater turbines (CNBC), solar firms eye supply tracing as China forced labor debated (Bloomberg $, E&E $), wind power sets new record in 2020 despite pandemic (Politico Pro $)

ELECTRIFICATION: New York [state] climate panel recommends gas bans, other measures to reduce building emissions (Politico Pro $), Bay Area cities have banned gas to fight climate change. But not Los Angeles (LA Times $), Seattle begins phasing fossil fuels out of its buildings (Utility Dive)

OIL & GAS: Lack of overhauls at US refiners could stall industry recovery (Reuters), OPEC+ pledges to puts speedy rebalancing of oil market (Bloomberg $)

ORPHANED WELLS: Environmental groups, state lawmakers focus on budget shortfall hurting DEP oil and gas well oversight capability (Charleston Gazette-Mail)

PIPELINES: Ilhan Omar wants Line 3 to get the Keystone XL treatment (E&E $, Truthout)

UTILITIES: Alliant, Duke announce generator shutdowns, accelerating nation's transition to coal-free status (Utility Dive)

WATER: How one of the world’s wettest major cities ran out of water (Bloomberg $)

EVs: 'Accelerated': how Amazon plans to deploy electric vans (E&E $)

CARBON CAPTURE: Scared by global warming? In Iceland, one solution is petrifying (Thomson Reuters Foundation)

BUSINESS: Bezos’ climate fund faces a reckoning with Amazon’s pollution (The Verge), Biden’s climate push gets early backlash from big business (Politico Pro $)

CARBON PRICING: EU carbon price soars to record highs (FT $), experts tell Biden: your climate goals require a carbon price (Bloomberg $), Land O'Lakes set for $2 million carbon credit sale to Microsoft (Bloomberg $, Reuters)

FINANCE: Fighting climate change by shutting down the money pipeline (Bloomberg $), JPMorgan’s ESG debt head expects sustainability-linked bond boom (Bloomberg $)

WILDLIFE: Report: protected [marine] areas aid wildlife, reduce climate impacts (E&E $)

INTERNATIONAL: Pacific islands’ most important megaphone falls into discord (New York Times $), Denmark strikes deal on £25bn artificial wind energy island (The Guardian), EU governments whipsawed by climate and coal lawsuits (Politico Pro $), Germany says it beat 2020 goal to cut greenhouse emissions (AP), struck by Amazon fires, Brazilians say they want greater environmental protection (Thomson Reuters Foundation)

• Automakers supported Trump’s clean-car rollback. Biden shouldn’t bend to their wishes now (LA Times, Editorial Board $)
• Erase structural racism: 5 steps Joe Biden can take to make US laws, policies more just (USA Today, Elaine Gross op-ed)
• Twitter thinks ads about climate change are bad. Big Oil's disinformation is fine, though. (MSNBC, Emily Atkin column)
• This popular and proven climate policy should be at the top of Congress’s to-do list (Vox, Leah Stokes and Sam Ricketts commentary)
• Trump may be gone, but misinformation won’t be (Blavity, Antonio Ingram op-ed)
• Latino voters to Joe Biden: Protect the environment while strengthening the economy (USA Today, Ben Monterroso op-ed)
• Water infrastructure — the unmet needs of low-income communities (The Hill, David Coursen, op-ed)
• Ending fossil fuel subsidies: a climate solution to get behind (The Hill, Matt Casale op-ed)
• The first step is admitting you have a problem (New York Times, Michael Patrick F. Smith op-ed $)
• On climate, Biden’s administration needs to combat zombie Trumpism quickly (The New Yorker, Bill McKibben column $)

Real Estate & Home Builders Join Fossil Fuels & Utilities To Stymie Climate Action In Mass

With the Biden administration bringing climate action back to the federal level, the fossil fuel industry is ramping up its efforts to deny, distract, and delay. But all politics is local, so to see how the industry will defend itself, let’s look at a case study: Massachusetts. It’s considered one of the most liberal states, home of notable national progressive figures. So why are advocates in the state running into such staunch opposition on climate policy? 

Well apparently it’s because Republican Governor Charlie Baker, who recently vetoed a climate bill that’s been amended and is back on his desk, is swayed by gas and utility lobbying and front groups who have been quietly working with the housing industry for a decade to destroy climate action in the commonwealth. 

The question of why climate legislation is running into fierce opposition is the subject of a new report from the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society. They analyzed over a thousand pieces of testimony and four thousand lobbying visits related to the 53 key environmental bills introduced in Massachusetts between 2013 and 2018, and found that 90% of the public’s testimony in legislative committees was in favor of the bills. But there was little legislative success. Why? 

The report points to key opposition coalitions — including electric and gas utilities, other fossil fuel industry groups, traditional power generators, and even the real estate industry — pooling their sizable resources to outspend advocates of clean energy by more than 3.5 to 1. 

While utility and fossil fuel involvement is sort of par for the course, it stands out that the three real estate groups, NAIOP (commercial real estate brokers), the Massachusetts Association of Realtors, and the Greater Boston Real Estate Board, spent a combined $2.6 million lobbying opposing climate and clean energy bills between 2013 and 2018. 

So now, even though all-electric buildings are already saving consumers money, and using gas for heating will raise prices and make it impossible for the state to reach its climate goals, Gov. Baker may continue to resist signing a bill to electrify buildings. 

And it probably has something to do with the lobbying done by the Mass Coalition for Sustainable Energy, which is basically just a front group from the gas pipeline company Enbridge and the gas utility Eversource that gets its funding from, you guessed it, an assortment of business and builder groups, including NAIOP. 

With fossil fuels, utilities, power generators, and the real estate industry as the four walls, they’ve built a house of climate denial in Massachusetts.

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