Public Power in NM? Quixotic Dream or Transformational Opportunity to Create a Diverse, Sustainable NM Economy
For the last two months, Retake has been meeting weekly with public power experts from Renewable Taos, the NM Land Office, New Energy Economy, Kit Carson Electric Coop, as well as with Maine advocates advancing a public power initiative in their state right now. For our Thursday evening Zoom, members of that team will form a panel that will open your eyes to exactly what NM could do to free itself from the constraints of securing our energy from monopoly utility operators like PNM and El Paso Electric.
Click here to register.
And Tell Your Friends
We will outline how this can be done and how generating and managing our own energy resources can result in the export of wind and solar to other states, generating a huge amount of sustainable revenue for the state coffers and thousands of new jobs..
Achieving Public Power in NM could be the single most transformative action we can take to advance an array of policy objectives: cleaner air, cheaper utilities, reduced emissions, more funding for children and less reliance on gas and oil.
If you want to get a head start on what is possible, click here for a concise breakdown from the American Public Power Institute outlining what public power is and how it has been achieved in other states.
But first, read below about our Zoom Webinar on Thursday and please sign up (Link above and below).
But please do just one more thing:
Put on your advocacy hat and…
Post this link to your FB page and/or send it to as many friends as possible. Encourage them to join the Webinar and to bring friends.
This is an opportunity that will require a major education & advocacy effort.
But We Can Do This!
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Public Power in NM? Quixotic Dream or Transformational Opportunity to Create a Diverse, Sustainable NM Economy
Zoom Conversation to Explore What is Possible
It is not exactly breaking news that for decades NM has been far too reliant upon gas and oil revenues, hampering efforts to regulate gas and oil and accelerate a just transition to renewable energy. The ETA has set an ambitious goal for NM’s transition to renewable energy use. But it was not designed to facilitate a transition to a more sustainable economy.
Find out how the creation of a state public utility could be the single most transformational change NM could make to advance an economic and environmental transition to a diverse economy and a sustainable future.
While increasing tax revenues by reforming our tax system is one important source of sustainable revenue and while growing film, media, eco-tourism, and other NM-bred industries would also help, public power offers the state a sustainable revenue opportunity that dwarfs these efforts.
Find out why allowing an Avangrid-PNM merger would create a partnership with an extraordinarily untrustworthy corporation that has exploited people and planet ruthlessly wherever it has operated.
Please share information about this important conversation.
Thursday, July 8, 6pm-7:30pm Conversation with Maine Energy Advocates, Renewable Taos & Kit Carson Electric Coop Trustee, Bob Bresnahan, & Utility Legal Expert, Mariel Nanasi. First, we will hear from from two Maine energy activists who are fighting Avangrid and advancing a statewide initiative to develop a state public utility in Maine. Then we will hear from NM experts on how a NM public utility could be created as an alternative to private shareholder owned utilities like PNM, Xcel and El Paso Electric. Our panelists will be:
- Vaughan Woodruff. Woodruff has been an outspoken advocate for renewable energy in Maine and has extensive experience implementing solar power within the Central Maine Power/Avangrid/Iberdrola utility territory. He has testified at the Public Utility Commission and is a powerful advocate for new legislation in Maine that would create a public power utility, Pine Tree Power, to protect the people of Maine from Avangrid’s incompetent, unreliable service and obstruction of distributed solar power.
- William Dunn, President of Sunset Point LLC. Dunnhas over 49 years of experience in working with electric utility organizations of all ownership types (i.e., public, private, local and federal). He has held senior positions in utilities and on power pool/market committees. Bill is a leading advocate and lobbyist for the newly proposed public power legislation in Maine and has testified extensively about the failures of Central Maine Power, Avangrid and Iberdrola to serve the public interest in Maine.
- Bob Bresnahan is a member of Renewable Taos, a Kit Carson Electric Coop Trustee. Bresnahan was Director of Technology Planning for Nike Inc. in the 1990s. Before that he worked as a technology consultant for companies like the DuPont Corporation and Group Health. Bob is one of the founders of Renewable Taos and has served on the Board of Kit Carson Electric Cooperative since 2016. He is a strong advocate for harnessing NM’s immense renewable energy potential by creating a state public utility, accelerating NM’s transition to 100% energy use, while also enabling the state to generate and transmit energy to other states, creating an immense level of sustainable revenue and hundreds of jobs.
- Mariel Nanasi, is Executive Director of New Energy Economy. Nanasi knows well the legal challenges involved in forming a public utility and the immense environmental and economic impact that are possible by creating a public utility.