Pennsylvania: Natural gas production, data centers, and fossil fuel subsidies are among the features of Governor Josh Shapiro’s energy plan that are barely distinguishable from the Trump administration’s plan.
Much of Shapiro’s Lightning Plan is a rehash of past economic proposals and a renewed commitment of his loyalty to bad actors like CNX and trade groups that lobby for the fossil fuel industry. Conspicuously absent from his plan is an environmental justice component, a facet of his proposal that aligns with the president’s attack on equity efforts.
February XX, 2025
The Honorable Josh Shapiro
Governor of Pennsylvania
Dear Governor Shapiro,
Within hours of taking office, Donald Trump issued a series of executive orders that set in motion his regressive energy agenda, relinquished any chance of America leading on the climate crisis, put many environmental protections in suspended animation, and erased any progress this country has made to address environmental injustice.
All of this happened as climate-enhanced wildfires continued to ravage Los Angeles, fires that started just days after the year ended when global temperatures exceeded 1.5℃.
The fires also started the same day you published your midterm accomplishments. Among them, you listed two that have been widely criticized by the environmental community. You entered into the “Radical Transparency” deal with CNX even though the company never made a secret that its reason for participating was to refute peer-reviewed research on the health impacts of fracking. The hydrogen hubs announced during your first year in office are, at worst, gifts to the fossil fuel industry and, at best, distractions from taking the real climate action Pennsylvania needs.
As the governor of the state that is the second largest producer of methane gas and that lags behind almost every other in the transition to renewable energy, you are uniquely positioned, and obligated, to effect urgently needed changes. Pennsylvania has always been an energy leader. It is past time for the state to establish itself as a renewable energy leader of the future and bring the fossil fuel era to a close.
The actions you take to address the climate crisis will provide immediate benefits to communities that have suffered the profound impacts of fracking for as long as two decades. The state has never tabulated what drilling and fracking costs us, but the human and environmental toll is immeasurable and devastating. You know that from the accounts you read in the report from the Grand Jury you convened.
Moreover, your actions can and must provide the environmental protection and progress on addressing climate change we will not see from the current administration in Washington. It is now up to you to protect the citizens of our Commonwealth.
Respectfully,
No False Climate Solutions PA
Signed:
Advocates for Behavioral Change
Alliance for Sustainable Communities – Lehigh Valley PA
Berks Gas Truth
Better Path Coalition
Breathe Easy Susquehanna County
Breathe Project
Climate Reality NEPA
Climate Reality Project: Susquehanna Valley PA chapter
Concerned Health Professionals of Pennsylvania
Delaware Riverkeeper Network
Don’t Gas the Meadowlands
Environmentalists Against War
Food & Water Watch
Greenfirecoalition Writers’ Forum
Lebanon Pipeline Awareness
Lycoming County Progressives
March on Harrisburg
Move Past Plastic (MPP)
NEPA Green Coalition
North Braddock Residents For Our Future
Pennsylvania Action on Climate
Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania
Project CoffeeHouse
Protect PT
Save Our Streams
Save Our Susquehanna
Schuylkill Pipeline Awareness
TIAA-Divest
WaSEPA
