Our Track Record

Timeline: ELPC Victories Dating Back to 1994

Clean Energy Track Record

High-Speed Rail Track Record

Forestry and Biodiversity Track Record

Water Quality Track Record

Building Our Clean Energy Future: Creating New Jobs,
Growing the Green Economy & Solving Global Warming Problems

Solving our global warming problems is the moral, economic, policy, political and technological challenge of our times. Clean energy development is the solutions path for creating jobs, spurring economic growth and avoiding global warming pollution.

ELPC is working to persuade key swing-vote Midwest/Great Plains Congresspeople to advance historic climate change solutions, and our rural renewable energy strategy attracts bipartisan support. In 2009, ELPC succeeded in quadrupling federal funding for the innovative Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) from $23 million to $100 million annually. REAP provides incentives for farmers, ranchers and rural small businesses to develop renewable energy and energy efficiency projects that are a win-win-win for farm income, job creation and rural economic development, and environmental quality.

ELPC’s national leadership is building coalitions that bridge agricultural, environmental and clean energy interests and combine with targeted state-level work. For example, ELPC’s staff leads the North Dakota Alliance for Renewable Energy and North Dakota Climate Solutions Partnership, and we helped catalyze the new South Dakota Wind Energy Association. ELPC chairs the City of Chicago’s Renewable Energy Working Group, which aims to achieve the Chicago Climate Action Plan’s wind energy and solar power goals.

Solar power is ready to take off, and ELPC jumpstarted Illinois’ new legislation providing 750 megawatts of solar power installation by 2015. ELPC leads the charge for Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Nebraska and South Dakota to adopt interconnection and net-metering standards — vital inside-baseball “rules of the road” for advancing distributed solar and wind power systems.

ELPC advances new energy efficiency policies and programs to reduce energy demand and pollution, create jobs, and save businesses and people money on utility bills. We helped achieve about $500 million in new energy efficiency investments through the utilities’ implementation of “performance standards” in Illinois, Iowa and Michigan, and we are now working on standards in Ohio. In 2009, ELPC’s long-term advocacy succeeded when Illinois enacted (finally!) the energy efficient residential building code that will produce large cost savings and avoid pollution.

Clean energy development is a positive solution, but we can’t allow more pollution from old-technology coal plants. ELPC achieved legal victories challenging new coal plants in Michigan and Kentucky while moving to force the clean up of old highly-polluting coal plants in Illinois.

Clean energy development will drive job creation and economic growth while helping solve our global warming problems. Our nation is approaching a breakthrough point for rapid clean energy deployment and a key decision point for reducing global warming pollution. We must win on both points, together.

Advancing High-Speed Rail Now!

A modern, fast, comfortable and convenient Midwest higher-speed rail system would provide 60 million people in eight states with a good new alternative to planes and cars — increasing mobility, reducing pollution, creating jobs and spurring economic development.

In 2009, the President and Congress made a breakthrough investment of $13 billion for high-speed rail development. This success results, in part, from years of ELPC’s work to build the right coalitions, make the right policy, economic and environmental case, and engage, inform and persuade the right leaders.

ELPC is working hard to ensure that this federal funding down payment is coupled with both a smart, coordinated regional plan, as well as complementary state investments. We’ve achieved progress on both fronts.

In July 2009, eight Midwest Governors and Chicago Mayor Daley came together at a High-Speed Rail Summit and committed to a joint plan for coordinated regional high-speed rail development, prioritization and funding. ELPC led the charge to achieve new, significant state investments in Iowa, Ohio and Illinois. The House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee authorized $50 billion more for national high-speed rail development.

ELPC is proud to play a key national and regional leadership role to advance the exciting Midwest High-Speed Rail vision into a reality.

Preserving Biodiversity in Forest Ecosystems

Wisconsin’s Northwoods is a special place to hike, camp, fish, hunt, canoe and enjoy the quiet of nature. It’s also a treasure trove of biodiversity. The challenge is creating the right balance of sustainable forestry activities and good-paying logging jobs while preserving biodiversity, wildlife habitat, threatened species and clean water. ELPC is challenging the Forest Service for allowing too much logging, too fast and in too many of the wrong places for protecting key natural resources. We won three federal court injunctions, settled four cases and are appealing three timber sale approvals. Will new Forest Service appointees shift policies to better protect natural resources and seize carbon storage opportunities? It’s time for change, and ELPC is helping to lead the charge.

The federal Clean Water Act was passed in 1972, but it still remains drastically underimplemented and underenforced, thereby threatening both aquatic health and safe drinking water supplies for millions of people. ELPC is focusing on making the Clean Water Act work well in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky and Wisconsin to reduce pollution of community rivers and the Mississippi River, America’s greatest waterway. Achieving progress requires action on multiple fronts: modern “anti-degradation” standards to keep clean water clean, reducing toxic run-off from coal mines and nitrogen pollution from farms, and disinfecting (finally) wastewater going into the Chicago River in order to help reach the Clean Water Act’s “fishable, swimmable” goal.