Renew Texas 2025 Pledge

1. Endless Supply — Renewable energy sources are virtually inexhaustible, easily accessible and rapidly expanding in most parts of in the world. Solar, wind, geothermal and tidal energy are examples of renewable energy. Fossil fuels are limited, finite resources that require significant amounts of energy and money to extract. Low-cost, reliable wind and solar power options are already available and being used successfully around the world.
2. No GHGs — Renewable energy is clean, safe and does not cause harmful pollution or release greenhouse gases, which cause global warming. Fossil fuel combustion is responsible for approximately three-quarters of human-caused climate change; land use change, deforestation and agriculture are responsible for the remaining quarter.
3. Improves Health — Using renewables is the healthy choice. According to the World Health Organization, more than 7 million people each year die from air pollution-related causes: 4.2 million from outdoor air pollution related to fossil fuel combustion and 3.8 million from interior air pollution caused by dirty cookstoves and fuels.
4. Creates Jobs — Supporting renewable energy electricity generation creates jobs in manufacturing, installation and technology. Texas is already home to more than 30,000 jobs in the wind and solar energy industry and more than 500 solar companies, approximately 100 of which are in manufacturing.
5. Economic Development — Texas sends the third-greatest amount of tax dollars to Washington DC of any state. Renewables Energy Investment Tax Credits will return hundreds of millions of dollars for the long-term benefit of Texans.
6. Economic Benefits — Immediate economic benefits are available, with a lower levelized cost of energy than any other generation source. (The levelized cost of energy allows comparison of different methods of electricity generation on a consistent basis.) Wind energy is already cheaper than natural gas throughout much of Texas. Solar can be cheaper as well for large-scale customers that install their own power generation capabilities (like Fort Hood) or for smaller-scale customers that combine their purchase power in an energy aggregation (like the State of Texas Renewable Energy Cooperative).
   
7. Economic Security and Energy Independence — Using renewables reduces the USA’s dependence on imported fuels, improves trade deficits and reduces the need for foreign intervention to protect national interests.
8. Saves Water and Increases Reliability — Using renewables helps Texas save its precious water. The production and combustion of fossil fuels require water, which can be a rare commodity in areas suffering from drought or extreme heat waves. Renewable energy production from wind and solar farms does not require water. Renewables like wind and solar energy use distributed systems, which makes them more reliable and resilient after a weather disaster than utility-scale, non-distributed systems. Distributed solar increases grid resiliency by utilizing decentralized generation and reduced need for more transmission lines. (Utility-scale wind and solar are perhaps more susceptible to weather disasters such as hurricanes and tornadoes).
9. Creates Business Opportunities — More than 150 companies across the globe have committed to making the shift to 100% renewable energy including Google, Apple, Nike, Ikea, Microsoft and Lego. In Texas, many organizations already are using 100% renewable energy, including Facebook’s Fort Worth Data Center, General Motors Arlington plant, Toyota’s North American headquarters in Plano and all 7-Eleven stores located in competitive energy markets.
10. Uses Local Assets — Texas has enough wind and solar energy potential to supply the entire country with electricity. We have abundant flat and open land where wind and solar can be co-located with agriculture. Texas already is a national leader in wind energy production, with 19.2% of electricity on the ERCOT grid in 2018 being supplied by wind and solar. The Roscoe Wind Farm is one of the largest wind-energy farms in the world.
11. Customer Demand — Students and customers want it. In Deloitte’s 2018 Resources Study, seven in 10 companies reported that customers were demanding that they draw at least some of their power from renewable sources. To learn more about people’s opinions on climate solutions, check out Yale Climate Opinion Maps 2021.
12. Accountability — It’s our responsibility. Texas is the highest producer of pollution from carbon emissions in the U.S. We need to act now to reduce our carbon footprint.

Bonus: Texas offers incentives like property tax rebates for individuals, families and businesses that use renewable energy sources. For more information, visit the Database of State Incentives for Renewables and Efficiency.

Many thanks to Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, climate scientist at Texas Tech University, and T.J. Ermoian, founder of Texas Energy Aggregation, for their editorial review to ensure the accuracy of these statements.