Charleston Gazette-Mail - If you don’t think the climate is changing, consider that Charleston used to have its first big snowfall around Thanksgiving. This year it was after New Year. And even West Virginians who see climate change as abstract and distant are watching confused daffodils sprouting in their yards in December and picking ticks…
Energy & Environment
Resilience - There’s a jolly old soul in West Virginia who’s laughing his a** off today. Who is this laugh-master? Why it’s Old King Coal, of course; and, he just got off the phone with Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV). Read the full article. On the call, West Virginia’s senior Senator told the old man he…
West Virginia levies a severance tax on the production value of coal, natural gas, oil, and other natural resources produced in the state. During the most recent legislative interim session, the Joint Committee on Finance proposed legislation to -- yet again -- cut the state's already low severance tax. This comes on the heels of…
Charleston Gazette-Mail - Last month I traveled to New York for my birthday on my first trip since COVID hit. Read the full op-ed.
The Guardian - The rise of Joe Manchin as a key power player for Democratic policymaking in 2021 is the result of a perfect storm for the US senator from West Virginia. Read the full article. His position as the Senate’s most conservative Democrat means he often has final say in what his party is able…
This blog post, co-authored by the Keystone Research Center's executive director Stephen Herzenberg and the WVCBP’s senior policy analyst Sean O'Leary, was originally published by the ReImagine Appalachia coalition. West Virginia is at the center of the national political storm surrounding the need to invest in infrastructure, in families, and in combating climate change. Notably, West Virginia…
Sierra - In mid-October, Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat, announced he would forgo the prosperity of his constituents and their descendants by refusing to vote for a climate measure billed as the nation’s last-ditch effort to secure a livable future. Read the full article. That measure is the Clean Electricity Payment Program, or CEPP, a…
Yahoo News - An Illinois Democrat has been criticized after dismissing West Virginia’s economy as “irrelevant" to his party's key climate policy in the social spending package. Read the full article. The Clean Electricity Performance Program would reward utilities that adopt renewable energy sources rather than fossil fuels, penalizing utilities that do not make the transition. The…
New York Times - So Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia will be responsible for putting together the Democratic climate plan. This is both understandable and terrifying. It’s understandable because Democrats need the vote of every one of their senators, which means doing whatever it takes to get skeptics on board. It’s terrifying because Manchin might end…
Pennsylvania Business Report - ReImagine Appalachia, an organization of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia labor leaders, policy experts and community leaders, urged U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) to support President Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better” legislation in an open letter Sunday. Read the full article. Published as a full-page ad in the Charleston Gazette-Mail,…