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Guide to State Participation in PJM Long-Term Scenario Development under FERC Order No. 1920
The document outlines the requirements of FERC Order No. 1920, which mandates that transmission providers develop at least three diverse Long-Term Scenarios over a 20-year horizon to plan electric transmission. It emphasizes that state participation is critical for these scenarios to accurately reflect state policies and priorities, particularly within the PJM Interconnection LLC.
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Document type: Guide
Federal Funding Programs for Clean Energy Deployment: A Guide for States
The document outlines a three-phase framework for states to maximize federal clean energy funding: Identification, Collaboration, and Implementation. It details a wide array of available federal grants, loans, and tax credits across generation, transmission, energy efficiency, and workforce development, emphasizing the role of the DOE, EPA, and USDA in supporting the transition to a clean power system.
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Document type: Fact sheet
Promoting the Development of Agricultural Cooperatives
The document outlines a two-pronged approach for governments to support agricultural cooperatives: creating a supportive regulatory and infrastructural environment and implementing initiatives for professional management. It emphasizes integrating sustainability and voluntary sustainability standards (VSSs) to improve market access and climate resilience, while providing diverse case studies from countries like Cambodia, China, and Costa Rica to illustrate successful models such as land shareholding cooperatives.
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Document type: Guide
US States and Carbon Dioxide Removal: Leadership Opportunities and Key Principles for Policymakers
The guide argues that US states are uniquely positioned to scale the carbon dioxide removal (CDR) industry by leveraging their specific geographies and regulatory authority. It outlines a framework for state leadership based on four core pillars: adopting approach-neutral and performance-based definitions of CDR, setting explicit removal targets aligned with carbon budgets, creating clear regulatory and permitting environments, and ensuring community-supported deployment through transparency and equity. The document emphasizes that CDR should complement, not replace, aggressive emissions reductions to avoid moral hazard.
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Document type: Guide
Ambición en la década crítica: Guía para el fortalecimiento de las NDC
The document outlines a 'Decalogue of Ambition' for NDCs, emphasizing the need for science-based emission reductions, sector-specific targets, and a transition away from fossil fuels. It details requirements for mitigation, including a 43% global reduction by 2030, and adaptation, focusing on climate resilience in agriculture, health, and infrastructure. The guide also stresses the importance of just transition, gender equality, and the mobilization of finance from developed to developing nations.
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Document type: Guide
The Community Guide to Cumulative Impacts Using Science and Organizing to Advance Public Health Policy
The document explains the science of cumulative impacts, contrasting traditional single-chemical risk assessments with a holistic approach that considers multiple pollution pathways, pollutant accumulation, and non-chemical stressors. It advocates for the precautionary principle and the regulation of chemicals as classes to better protect overburdened communities, while emphasizing that lived experience and qualitative data are essential scientific components for effective policy.
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Document type: Guide
Using Science and Organizing to Advance Public Health Policy
The Community Guide to Cumulative Impacts explains how to identify and quantify the combined effects of multiple pollutants and social stressors on public health. It details existing state and city laws in the US that allow regulators to deny permits based on cumulative impacts and provides a framework for community organizing, including drafting model legislation and using environmental justice mapping tools.
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Document type: Guide
Our guide to the UN Biodiversity Conference (CBD COP16)
The UN Biodiversity Conference (CBD COP16), held in Cali, Colombia, focuses on delivering the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which aims to "halt and reverse" biodiversity loss by 2030. Key negotiations center on National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs), monitoring mechanisms, and resource mobilization, specifically the goal for high-income countries to provide USD 30 billion to low-income countries by 2030 via the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBFF). The conference emphasizes the role of Indigenous Peoples and local communities under the theme "Peace with Nature."
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Document type: Guide
Qu’est-ce qui rend les minéraux et les métaux « critiques » ?
The document outlines a methodology for governments to identify 'critical' or 'strategic' minerals based on technical, economic, and geopolitical risks. It emphasizes that criticality is dynamic and varies depending on whether a country is a producer or a consumer. The guide proposes a four-step process: understanding criticality, conducting a risk inventory and mapping, making strategic decisions, and performing regular reviews. It provides detailed indicators across geological, economic, social, environmental, and geopolitical dimensions to help countries maximize the benefits of the energy and digital transitions.
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Document type: Guide
POLICYMAKERS' TOOLKIT FOR A JUST TRANSITION FROM FOSSIL FUELS
The document argues that a just transition requires wealthy, high-emitting nations to phase out fossil fuels first and fastest while providing financial and technological support to less wealthy countries. It outlines a broad menu of policy tools across resource management, financial markets, fiscal and monetary policy, economic diversification, and global governance to manage the decline of fossil fuel production and consumption equitably.
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Document type: Guide
What Makes Minerals and Metals “Critical”? A practical guide for governments on building resilient supply chains
The document outlines a methodology for governments to define and assess 'critical' or 'strategic' minerals, emphasizing the need for producing countries to leverage their resources for industrial development. It proposes a four-step process: understanding criticality, taking stock of risks and opportunities, making strategic decisions, and establishing a regular review cycle. The guide provides detailed checklists across geological, economic, social, environmental, geopolitical, and regulatory dimensions to help policymakers identify bottlenecks and strategic assets in the context of the energy and digital transitions.
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Document type: Guide
Wiser with Wood MAKING EUROPE WORK FOR PEOPLE & FORESTS
The document argues that treating wood burning as renewable energy has led to forest degradation, high CO2 emissions, and public health risks. It outlines the legal requirements of RED III and urges Member States to use their discretion to phase out biomass subsidies, implement the cascading principle, and adopt stricter sustainability criteria to protect European forests and the climate.
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Document type: Guide
Nyumba yetu ya pamoja
The document argues that the current ecological crisis is driven by fossil-fuel-based economic systems and excessive consumption. It calls for a fundamental shift in economic and behavioral patterns, emphasizing the interconnectedness of climate change, biodiversity loss, water scarcity, air pollution, and social inequality. The guide advocates for a 'just transition' that protects the poor and marginalized, who suffer most from environmental degradation despite contributing the least to it.
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Document type: Guide
Mwongozo wa kutunza Sayari yetu hai
The document outlines the environmental crises caused by fossil-fuel-driven economic systems, emphasizing the need for a 'just transition' and a shift toward circular economies. It highlights the critical state of biodiversity, water security, and air quality, noting that the poorest populations suffer most despite contributing least to the problem. The guide calls for systemic changes in food production, energy use, and consumption patterns to protect the planet for future generations.
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Document type: Guide
Clean Hydrogen NECP Playbooks for EU Member States
The document argues that clean hydrogen should be treated as a 'precious molecule' and prioritised for 'no regrets' hard-to-abate industrial sectors rather than being deployed indiscriminately. It recommends that EU Member States move beyond a sole focus on renewable ('green') hydrogen to include other low-carbon pathways, such as nuclear ('pink') and natural gas with carbon capture ('blue'), to avoid resource constraints. The guide emphasises locating production close to end-users to minimise transport inefficiencies and suggests that hydrogen in transport be limited to heavy-duty trucking, aviation, and shipping, while light-duty vehicles should prioritise electrification. Finally, it advises leveraging EU and national support mechanisms to fund 'champion' projects across the entire value chain.
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Document type: Guide
Small Modular Reactors
The document argues that SMRs can provide 'clean firm' power to decarbonize industrial systems and bolster energy security in the EU. It identifies that while 12 countries mention SMRs in draft NECPs and 7 plan investments, significant work is needed to improve these plans. The guide outlines five key recommendation areas: developing planning competencies (including techno-economic assessments and workforce studies), strengthening regional cooperation (such as joint licensing and a Joint Procurement Platform), enhancing financial frameworks (using contracts for difference and state aid), establishing national R&D and demonstration programmes, and creating industry-informed roadmaps. It specifically highlights the need for regulators to diversify competence beyond Light Water Reactors to evaluate advanced technologies like molten salt reactors.
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Document type: Guide
Investment Facilitation for Development Agreement
The Investment Facilitation for Development Agreement (IFDA) aims to facilitate foreign direct investment (FDI), particularly for developing countries and least developed countries (LDCs), to foster sustainable development. The agreement focuses on improving transparency, streamlining administrative procedures, and enhancing cooperation between governments and investors. It includes specific special and differential treatment (S&DT) provisions, allowing developing and LDC members to self-designate implementation timelines across three categories (A, B, and C) based on their capacity. While it includes articles on responsible business conduct and anti-corruption, these are excluded from the WTO's dispute settlement mechanism. The agreement is currently being pursued as a plurilateral agreement under Annex 4 of the WTO Agreement, though this remains a point of debate among WTO members regarding the principle of consensus and the implementation burden on resource-strapped nations.
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Document type: Guide
How Cities Can Scale On-Site Solar with New Federal Incentives
The City of San Antonio has approved a deal with Big Sun Solar to install approximately 13 MW of solar capacity across 42 city-owned facilities and parking lots. This project is notable for being among the first to use the 'direct pay' (Elective Pay) mechanism established by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of August 2022, which allows tax-exempt entities to receive tax credits to reduce upfront costs. The project is expected to offset about 11 percent of electricity consumption for City operations and generate net savings of $7–$11 million over 25 years. The guide outlines four lessons for other cities: aggregating small projects for economies of scale, leveraging tax credit bonuses for low-income or energy communities, planning for the time lag in receiving direct pay refunds, and maintaining flexibility in procurement to compare different financial structures using net present value.
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Document type: Guide
Questions for Candidates 2024
The Union of Concerned Scientists provides a guide for voters to hold 2024 political candidates accountable across several key areas: clean energy and transportation, climate accountability, climate change resilience, food system reform, nuclear weapons policy and justice, and the protection of scientific integrity within federal agencies.
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Document type: Guide
Good Policy Paper: Guiding Practice from the Policies of Independent Accountability Mechanisms
The document outlines best practices for Independent Accountability Mechanisms (IAMs) within financial institutions, focusing on ensuring they are accessible, transparent, and effective in providing remedy to communities harmed by investments. It details essential structural elements for independence, such as direct reporting to the Board and restrictions on 'revolving door' employment. The guide defines three core functions: Compliance Review for investigating policy violations, Dispute Resolution for voluntary party-led solutions, and Advisory for systemic institutional learning. It emphasizes the need for simple admissibility requirements, proactive outreach in local languages, and the protection of complainants from retaliation. Finally, it argues that for IAMs to be truly effective, financial institutions must commit to implementing management action plans and establishing dedicated remedy funds.
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Document type: Guide