HARTFORD, CT – The state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection released its annual report on Connecticut’s greenhouse gas emissions Thursday, revealing a mixed picture of the state’s efforts to combat climate change.
The report’s release arrived two days after news broke that Gov. Ned Lamont, as well as one of his neighbors and a property association, had been cited by the Greenwich Inland Wetlands Commission for illegally cutting down 180 trees in a protected wetland to improve their properties’ views of a nearby pond. The governor is on vacation in Florida with his family this week.
“This is a report that DEEP prepares every year. It’s essentially Connecticut’s climate report card, where we track our progress as a state in meeting the goals that the legislature has established for reducing greenhouse gas emissions across our economy,” DEEP Commissioner Katie Dykes said.
The DEEP’s emissions report covers the timeframe from 1990 through 2021, with preliminary data for 2022. While emission levels dropped significantly in 2020 because of stay-at-home orders during the COVID-19 pandemic, the report shows that Connecticut has been moving in the wrong direction since.
“The key takeaways from this report are that emissions have increased for two consecutive years. Essentially, we saw a significant decline in emissions that happened in 2020 due to the global COVID-19 pandemic,” Dykes said. “And what we’re seeing in the data up through 2022 is that these emissions have rebounded. So they were essentially back to the emission levels that we saw prior to the pandemic. This is not good news because we actually need to be on a trajectory of achieving a more rapid decline.”
According to the report released on Thursday, Connecticut has made some progress toward combating climate change. The state reached its goal of reducing emissions to 10% below 1990 levels by 2020, as set out by the Global Warming Solutions Act. However, this goal was accomplished by reducing emissions from power plants and other energy industries. The top emitter of greenhouse gasses, transportation, has not seen a significant decrease since 1990. Residential use of fossil fuels for heating and other purposes is the second highest emitter of emissions.
“Given the trajectory that we’re on it’s clear that we have a really tough road ahead of us preparing for the impacts of climate change that are already certain,” said Charles Rothenberger, the climate and energy attorney for Save the Sound, which is a nonprofit dedicated to the protecting Long Island Sound.
“Polling shows that strong majorities of Connecticut citizens support taking action on climate across all levels of government, not just at the federal level, but at the state and local level again as well,” Rothenberger said. “Yet time and again, unfortunately, we’ve seen a failure to act on the part of our elected leaders, whether it’s the refusal to ratify the [multi-state Transportation and Climate Initiative Program] or the recent decision on the part of the legislature not to take up and vote on adopting California Motor Vehicle Emission Standards, essentially unwinding 20 years’ worth of adherence to the most stringent vehicle emission standards available to Connecticut under federal law.”
In addition to their impact on the worldwide aspect of climate change, Connecticut’s greenhouse gas emissions are having a negative effect on air quality for all residents, said Ruth Canovi, director of advocacy for the American Lung Association.
“Yesterday, the Lung Association released our 25th annual State of the Air Report, which looks at two dangerous air pollutants: ozone pollution and particulate matter,” Canovi said. “This year’s report found that once again, Connecticut received an F grade in four of our eight counties for high ozone levels, and that Fairfield County has the worst ozone pollution east of Texas. Sixty-two percent of Connecticut residents live in counties with failing grades for air pollution. These pollutants can cause health emergencies, including asthma attacks, heart attacks, and other lung and cardiovascular diseases, to name a few.”
Canovi and the other speakers called upon the Connecticut General Assembly to pass legislation to start turning the tide on climate change, including House Bill 5004, which would take direct actions to combat climate change, and HB 5485, which would offer support for building out the state’s electric vehicle infrastructure.
In the last few years, Connecticut residents have experienced more weather conditions considered extreme within the context of the state’s typical weather patterns, including historic drought conditions in 2022 to “unprecedented” flooding in 2023. Temperatures have been hotter for longer periods and storms have been more severe.
The World Health Organization declared that 2023 was the hottest year on record, and that the previous 10-year period was the hottest 10 years ever recorded. A United Nations report predicts that current trends will lead to global temperatures rising by as much as 2.6 degrees celsius by 2100. According to NASA, a global temperature rise of 2 degrees celsius would have a wide range of potentially lethal effects for living species on Earth, including drought, extreme precipitation, and a dangerous rise in sea level.
