BATON ROUGE, La. (Jan. 31, 2022) – The Water Institute was proud to support the development of the state’s first ever Louisiana Climate Action Plan which received unanimous approval from the Climate Initiatives Task Force this morning.
According to the Governor’s release this afternoon, “Louisiana’s Plan contains a balanced set of recommendations to limit the severity of climate change while positioning the state to maintain its economic competitiveness in a low-carbon future. The science-based plan achieves the Governor’s goals of reaching net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050, putting the state in line with pledges made under the Paris Agreement, and by the federal government, 25 other states, and hundreds of companies in the private sector.” Read the full release here.
“The Water Institute of the Gulf was proud to provide scientific and planning support to the Climate Initiatives Task Force as it weighed the best approaches to tackling climate change in Louisiana,” said Alyssa Dausman, Senior Vice President and Chief Scientist at The Water Institute of the Gulf. “Together our team was able to provide the Task Force with both qualitative and quantitative information across a wide swath of metrics and objectives to help inform their deliberations within a fast-moving planning process.”
During the development of the plan, The Water Institute brought its expertise in “Structured Decision Making” to facilitate a collaborative planning process for the Task Force. This process allowed the Task Force to question, evaluate, understand and communicate the impact of potential policies and strategies on net GHG emissions as well as other goals identified by the Task Force related to Louisiana’s quality of life, equity, economy and environment.
“Their (The Water Institute) commitment to this effort is truly outstanding and we couldn’t have underpinned this effort with science and such a tremendous process without their help,” Harry Vorhoff, deputy director at Louisiana Governor’s Office of Coastal Activities, said at the Jan. 31 Task Force meeting.
Through this process, the Task Force came up with 17 fundamental objectives within seven groups to guide the evaluation of strategies considered in the development of the plan. These include: Reducing net greenhouse gas emissions; improving health and quality of life for residents and communities; creating a more equitable society; strengthening the economy and workforce, conserving natural resources; adapting to a changing climate; and managing for short- and long-term success.
“The Task Force, four Advisory Groups and six Sector Committees brought together more than 100 experts in numerous fields with different backgrounds and interests,” said Soupy Dalyander, Water Institute lead on Structured Decision Making. “Using this process, we were able to facilitate the discussion to find those fundamental objectives that help guide the discussion and priorities across interests.”
The Water Institute also partnered with the non-partisan think tank Energy Innovation, LLC and RMI to develop the Louisiana Energy Policy Simulator (EPS), an open source modeling tool which allows users to estimate climate policy impacts through 2050 and consider how policies interact with one another.
“The Louisiana EPS provided valuable insights to the Task Force and planning team about how to revise and improve the draft set of climate strategies and actions for greater impact,” said Allison DeJong, planner and policy researcher at The Water Institute. “Analyses modeled in the tool served as a strong foundation for the Task Force to understand potential consequences, tradeoffs, and priorities to consider.”
“It’s been a tough, but incredibly rewarding experience to work with so many people in Louisiana who were engaged and brought so much to this transparent and collaborative planning process,” said Colleen McHugh, senior adaptation planner at The Water Institute. “Within a very short time period, people representing all facets of Louisiana came together to develop an ambitious Climate Action Plan that, when implemented, will have many benefits for Louisiana’s people, economy and environment.”
The Climate Action Plan will be delivered to the Governor on Feb. 1 and the Task Force will meet again in early March to move forward with the plan’s implementation. An executive summary of the Climate Action Plan can be found here.