More than 67,000 comments submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency in support of its Clean Energy Incentive Program came in Tuesday as the comment period for the program closed, according to the Climate Reality Project, which organized a commenting campaign. “The Clean Energy Incentive Program encourages states to invest in technologies like solar, wind, and energy efficiency,” said Ken Berlin, president and CEO of the Climate Reality Project. “We are proud of the thousands of Climate Reality supporters who have commented on the Incentive Program and who are helping to accelerate the national shift to clean, renewable energy.”
The CEIP is a component of the EPA’s Clean Power Plan, which requires states to develop action plans to meet federally set emissions reduction goals. Under the voluntary CEIP, states can issue “early action allowances” or “early action emission rate credits,” which the EPA then matches. “States in turn provide these awarded matching compliance instruments to the providers of eligible CEIP [renewable energy] and low-income community projects that received the early action allowances or early action ERCs from the state,” the proposal explains.
The release of the CEIP design details in June was controversial, given the program’s relationship to the Clean Power Plan, which the EPA is legally barred from enforcing under a Supreme Court order while a lawsuit against the rule advances through the federal courts. The agency has held that because developing the CEIP does not force implementation of the Clean Power Plan it is in no way violating the stay while it battles the lawsuit.