Colorado's Legislature is failing the critical climate moment. Can it step up?

Yahoo

25-04-2025

A haze of wildfire smoke and ozone pollution clogged the skies above Denver in July 2024. The Colorado Legislature is failing to check the Trump administration's attacks pollution-reducing policies and climate action. (Chase Woodruff/Colorado Newsline)
I've climbed the Colorado Capitol's steps over the last few months working to push elected leaders to make real local climate progress while the Trump administration attacks the very idea of environmental justice nationwide and strips key environmental laws. Unfortunately, with only weeks left in the session, I am left worried that Colorado communities are being abandoned by governing bodies.
Every week Trump and his billionaire cronies find new ways to gut the EPA, reverse significant progress on reducing pollution, and undermine public lands protections. Now is the time when Colorado's elected officials should be creating a bulwark against these attacks on our communities.
In fact, Coloradans are demanding meaningful legislation to protect public lands from mass sell-offs, a rapid transition to 100% clean energy, and affordable energy and transit solutions that help clean up our air. Across every corner of the state thousands have shown up protesting in support of federal workers, many of whom work in the sciences. Progressive politicians Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drew one the largest crowds at the Capitol in recent history.
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The call for real action and an agenda that helps working people is loud, but may be going unheard. A rare Democratic trifecta should be an opportunity to champion policy solutions to Colorado's environmental problems, preserving clean air and water. So with just weeks left in the session, what did they get up to?
Unfortunately, the 2025 session has been one of frustrating backsliding and failure.
We've witnessed several pieces of legislation accelerate through the House and Senate that significantly threaten Colorado's ability to lead on environmental protections. For example, a bill that defines nuclear energy as a 'clean energy resource' was recently signed by the governor, despite similar legislation being easily defeated in previous legislative sessions. Nuclear energy, which is objectively not a clean resource, is extraordinarily expensive and increasingly unrealistic according to experts, distracting us from Colorado's continued need to invest in proven renewable energy resources such as wind, solar and storage.
In the same vein of pursuing underdeveloped technologies, House Bill 25-1165 advanced through both chambers. It incentivizes experimental carbon capture and storage efforts, which are energy intensive and a false solution to our climate crisis.
But perhaps the most telling example of the Colorado General Assembly's Democratic leadership to align with the Trump paradigm is an effort to introduce a new Colorado 'DOGE' (Department of Government Efficiency). This legislation would grant significant and inappropriate authority to the state auditor and presents existential threats to state agencies tasked with enforcing environmental protections, including the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
Finally, after claiming that it was too late to introduce a long-developed bill ensuring 100% clean energy by 2040, leaders then introduced a last-minute bill that would give giant tech corporations incentives to build out massive data centers that drain water and potentially drive up energy costs on families and businesses.
This lack of ambition at best, and selling out of our communities at worst, indicate that Colorado's elected officials at the state Capitol are unwilling or unable to meet the moment we find ourselves in as a state and as a nation. The most hostile federal administration ever elected is recalibrating U.S. priorities. In a state where people value clean air, clean water, public lands and climate action, our public officials should be willing to defy the Trump administration's attempts to endanger that which we hold dear.
Instead, I fear they've capitulated.
Everyday Coloradans and, in particular, disproportionately impacted communities will bear the brunt of the climate inaction in coming years. Organizations like the Sierra Club must continue calling on our leaders to pass bold legislation that reduces emissions, holds polluters accountable, and protects the natural beauty of our state. In the last weeks, let's see what our leaders can salvage out of this session. While bleak, it isn't over.
Our members and supporters will continue to push and hope for the best while preparing for the worst.
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