A bi-partisan gathering of legislators, business people, and environmental advocates were at the Texas State Capitol in Austin last week as State Senator Eddie Lucio, Jr. and State Representative Pete Gallego introduced legislation to allow the further development of the emerging renewable technologies market.
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During this session, Texas legislators are looking at close to 100 bills filed on renewable energy, double the number filed during the last legislative session. 12 of the bills propose specific goals for increasing solar power, geothermal, renewable bio-mass, and small-scale wind.
Lucio and Gallego filed identical bills that would raise the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard. The measures would increase electrical utilities’ renewables generating capacity from resources other than “high capacity wind” to 4,000 megawatts by the year 2020.
“We have met our goals for wind and we are very fortunate in Texas to have massive clean energy resources besides wind,” said Senator Lucio. “This legislative session, five different senators – Republicans and Democrats, urban and rural, and six different representatives – Republicans and Democrats, urban and rural agree.”
“We have all introduced legislation that would raise the Renewable Portfolio Standard requiring utilities to give Texans the clean energy they are asking for and industries are prepared to deliver – technologies like solar power, geothermal energy, and renewable biomass,” Lucio said.
“The time is now to tap the powerful, clean energy resources that we have and to create green jobs for Texans,” he said.
