A report from the NAACP says Missouri should increase production of renewable power and require utilities to offer energy efficiency programs.
Accomplishing those goals, the report says, could provide better health, cheaper utility bills and more manufacturing jobs in the state’s urban core.
The report released on Thursday said that 68 percent of African Americans throughout the country live within a 30-mile radius of coal-power plants. That proximity, the study says, leads to more asthma among African-American children and lung disease.
“It is past time to revolutionize the relationship communities of color have with this multi-billion-dollar industry,” the report said, referring to the energy industry. “Leading in a new energy economy serves as a pathway out of poor health, poverty and joblessness while establishing a foundation of energy resources and security for generations to come.”
While the report commended Missouri’s 15 percent renewable energy requirement by 2021, it added that the state should strive for a 25 percent requirement by 2025. It also said that Missouri should require utilities to have energy-efficiency programs – instead of making them voluntary. And it recommended that the state expand training programs and notification about procurement opportunities for minority-owned businesses.
Most of these recommendations would require changes to Missouri laws. But if accomplished, St. Louis NAACP President Adolphus Pruitt says the urban core could benefit.
Not only would the health of African-American families improve if Missouri used less coal power, Pruitt said, but it could also mean lower utility bills for poor families. He also said that even though wind power may be located primarily in outstate Missouri, the technology can be manufactured in cities.
“It’s going to create all sorts of jobs,” Pruitt said. “We’re also looking at some re-entry programs for prisoners where we can move them to a point where they can install solar panels and learn some of the things from that industry.”
Missouri Sierra Club President John Hickey said, “The thing about energy efficiency jobs is they’re local. You can’t take an installation job and do it in China instead of in St. Louis because the job has to be done here.”
In response to a query about the NAACP study, Ameren noted it “has invested in the largest energy efficiency program in the state of Missouri since last year. We are committed to energy efficiency as an important money-saving option for our customers.”
It touted its Maryland Heights Renewable Energy Center as one of the largest trash-to-energy centers in the U.S., investment in hydroelectric power and the O’Fallon Renewable Energy Center “that will harness solar power for our customers.”
Pruitt said, “I think we can find a way to migrate away from coal. We just want to make sure that state government does what it needs to do to bring the state along to create those green jobs and help bring the economy along.”
Edited slightly and reprinted with permission from news.stlpublicradio.org.