For years, Del. Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, has introduced a bill directing state utility regulators to develop energy efficiency programs allowing for lower-cost electricity and utility costs. And for years that bill has failed to make it to a committee agenda or the floor of the House of Delegates.
Hansen has hoped that lawmakers would be swayed by the argument that upgrading homes to be more energy efficient would help lower utility costs for residents.
And if that didn’t work, he added in something else to win the support of other lawmakers: jobs.
“I’m always looking for policies that will both reduce greenhouse gas emissions and create jobs,” Hansen explained. “It’s always important to lead with the jobs argument at the Legislature, because a lot of climate change deniers are in office.”
According to the International Energy Agency, energy efficiency — which means using less energy to power homes, run cities and operate equipment — is a significant part of the larger energy industry, employing millions of workers across the country. More than 6,600 workers were employed in the industry in West Virginia in 2022.
Research from the federal government has argued that adopting energy efficient policies will spur job creation, particularly in construction and manufacturing — key industries where West Virginia leaders want to expand the workforce. And those jobs are likely to have a ripple effect across the economy as lower energy bills enable people to spend more money.
But Hansen’s bill, as he’s quick to acknowledge, faces difficult odds. For one, Hansen is one of a remaining handful of Democrats in a Legislature where Republicans hold supermajorities in both chambers. And lawmakers are divided on clean energy.
“There’s a lot of people here that will oppose any bills that will allow the use of renewables or alternative energy resources, anything that will compete with coal,” he said. “But then there’s also a significant number of legislators who recognize that we need to have an ‘all-of-the-above’ approach.”
Those divisions have already been made clear in the early days of the 2024 session. Last week, a Senate committee meeting about economic development was derailed by a single line in a bill about net-zero carbon, a mention that lawmakers included to take advantage of a flood of federal money encouraging renewable energy and the creation of a clean energy workforce. The state meanwhile, continues to rank at the bottom of several national energy scorecards, including in rankings of energy efficiency.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” Hansen said. But, “there’s still people at this Legislature that would prefer to forego that funding and those opportunities to position ourselves to succeed in the future just on the hope that the coal industry is going to come back.”
