Memphis mayor joins call for climate change-fighting measure proposed by Biden administration

Memphis mayor joins call for climate change-fighting measure proposed by Biden administration

Samuel Hardiman

Memphis Commercial Appeal

Sept. 22, 2021, 6:01 a.m. CT

Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland joined a bevy of Southern mayors and asked Congress to pass a renewable energy standard for the U.S. as a key move in combatting climate change.

The letter was signed by two dozen mayors and released Monday by the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, a renewable energy nonprofit and advocacy group.

It effectively endorses the Clean Electricity Performance Program, a policy that, if enacted, would effectively pay utilities to grow the amount of renewable energy generated each year. Utilities that didn't grow renewable energy would owe money to the government. The proposed policy is a key piece of President Joe Biden's effort to decarbonize the country's electric grid.

Strickland's signature on such a letter is notable because Memphis, Light, Gas and Water, the city-owned utility Strickland oversees, is asking the private sector for proposals on its electricity supply, including renewable energy.

The mayor and his staff won't be directly involved in the electricity bidding, but he appoints the MLGW board members who vote on what path the utility ultimately pursues. He and Doug McGowen, the city's chief operating officer, have also been personally involved in the power supply process, brokering compromises between MLGW leadership and the Memphis City Council.

The city administration also filed comments in a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission dispute over whether several small Tennessee utilities can use the Tennessee Valley Authority's transmission system or whether the utilities would be forced to build a separate transmission network. The result of that dispute could have broad ramifications for whether MLGW leaves TVA, which supplies Memphis and Shelby County with all its electricity.

Beyond the power supply conversation, it is another signal of the Strickland administration's push to go green, or at least steer the conversation in that direction. Memphis 3.0, the voluminous comprehensive plan the city wrote, included an entire climate action plan.

Strickland opposed the Byhalia Connection Pipeline over concerns for what a potential leak could do to the Memphis Sand aquifer.

Samuel Hardiman covers Memphis city government and politics for The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached by email at samuel.hardiman@commercialappeal.com or followed on Twitter at @samhardiman.