ReImagine Appalachia’s blueprint details the organization’s vision and plan. Both must rely on Appalachia’s skilled workers and farmers while also offering hope for the region’s next generation—of all races, ethnicities, and genders. The policy priorities outlined in this document would create over half a million good, family sustaining jobs by investing in people and communities.

“The United States is the birthplace of some of history’s most revolutionary ideas,” Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey writes in a recent Pittsburgh Post-Gazette op-ed. “Now, we can be the first to conquer the next urgent task: building a 21st-century sustainable, equitable economy where clean energy powers our lives at home and work, creates quality union jobs with high wages, and frees us from the outdated fuels that pollute our air and water and change our climate.”

Policymakers’ pursuit of natural gas development is failing rural Pennsylvania, economic data show. The state’s rural natural gas counties have lost jobs every year since 2012 and are struggling with a rate of population loss among the worst in the nation.

Centralia, WA, a formerly struggling coal town that revitalized its economy and created thousands of jobs with targeted investments in clean energy, energy efficiency, and education, could provide a blueprint for job growth and economic transition in Appachian coal and natural gas communities.

The US shale boom and efforts by other countries to exploit their shale resources could reshape energy and environmental landscapes across the world. But how might those landscapes change? Will countries with significant physical reserves try to exploit them? Will they protect or harm local communities and the global climate? Will the benefits be shared or retained by powerful interests? And how will these decisions be made?

How can energy policies navigate an orderly transition out of coal to renewable energy? Shanti Gamper-Rabindran’s paper analyzes Ohio policies that exemplify how state regulators and governments prolong the operations of coal-fired power plants, detailing how the state’s House Bill 6 (2019) bailed out uneconomic plants and stalled renewable energy and energy efficiency growth.

“Americans have an important decision to make: Do we fully embrace renewable energy, or do we divert scarce public funding to explore unproven technologies like blue hydrogen and carbon capture that can double down on fossil fuel dependency?” University of Pittsburgh Professor Shanti Gamper’s op-ed in The Hill lays out why taxpayers should scrutinize hydrogen and carbon capture projects that may not be financially viable or effective vehicles for decarbonization.

A new project to create a regional sustainable finance hub would drive investment that supports clean energy and other industries and creates good paying jobs in both cities and outlying areas, Tom Croft writes. The hub is a major first step toward repairing our region’s communities and ushering in a new, equitable, and sustainable era.

A new clean energy pathway developed by Strategen Consulting for the Ohio River Valley Institute would result in a 97% reduction in CO2 emissions from the power sector by 2050, resulting in annual benefits of $2.69B, higher than those associated with a pathway dependent on natural gas and carbon capture and storage technology. Additionally, energy efficiency combined with electrification of the buildings and transportation sectors results in load growth totaling 33% over the period.

Transitioning to clean energy means job growth, shared prosperity, and a safer, cleaner future for Western Pennsylvania. The Ohio River Valley Institute’s forthcoming decarbonization study, produced by Strategen Consulting, describes an energy transition pathway for the ten-county region of Western Pennsylvania that reduces emissions, cuts costs, and creates jobs more effectively than any fossil fuel-based pathway.

Remarks presented by Sean O’Leary, a Senior Researcher at the Ohio River Valley Institute, for “Zero-Carbon Resources and Appalachia’s Sustainable Finance Hub,” an official side event of the 2022 Global Clean Energy Action Forum.

Remarks presented by Joanne Kilgour, Executive Director of the Ohio River Valley Institute, for “Zero-Carbon Resources and Appalachia’s Sustainable Finance Hub,” an official side event of the 2022 Global Clean Energy Action Forum.