The South Dakota Public Utilities Commission will soon be deciding whether to grant a new permit for TransCanada to build the Keystone XL pipeline. But the PUC has said it will not allow the public to testify at the hearing on May 5th -- The SD PUC is attempting to limit the testimony to a few written submissions. They are refusing to hear the people. Let's remind them they work for the people, and that means allowing their voices to be heard. Stand in support of Tribal Nations, farmers and ranchers in South Dakota who are fighting Keystone XL, and join their call on the Public Utilities Commission to let all of the voices be heard at the hearing on May 5. South Dakota Tribes along with Dakota Rural Action have filed official objections to TransCanada's permit application for Keystone with the SD PUC, and will be among those parties allowed to testify at the hearing on May 5. But there are many voices of those who stand in solidarity to protect the land and water that won't be heard, unless we convince the PUC to change course and add a public comment portion to the hearing, so the wide range of voices with concerns about this massive threat to our heartland, climate and the well being of women and children are heard. Sign the petition: Let the people's voices be heard on Keystone XL.

We've been asked to reduce the water we use. No one should be exempt, especially the highest users of water in California.

Once home to the CA grizzly and CA condor, the Santa Ana Mountain range is severely threatened by urban sprawl, pollution, altered fire regime, abuse and neglect. Currently, there are multiple landowners, including US Forest Service, OC Parks, Riverside County Parks, Rancho Mission Viejo, CA State Parks, military, NGOs, private individuals and investment groups. The US Forest Service owns one of the largest portions, but lacks the budget and staff to adequately manage for natural and cultural resource value.

Established in 2005, the Washington Renewable Energy Cost Recovery Program (CRP) provides an annual payment of 12 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for electricity from qualifying wind electric systems – as currently enacted – until June 2020. Several factors have limited distributed wind in Washington State, and the incentive is now being revamped primarily to benefit solar electric systems. The existing incentive rate for wind has not been sufficient to motivate consumers to act. Even though the capital costs are higher for distributed wind, the incentive rates for solar have been much higher, particularly for numerous adders not available for wind. In addition, the $5,000 annual cap on payments per participant limits the size of wind turbines that can be cost-effectively installed. Current proposed legislation, including HB 2045 and SB 5892, will either treat wind and solar technologies the same despite wind's higher capital costs, or eliminate the wind incentive entirely in 2016. Alongside efforts to revamp and extend Washington's Renewable Energy Cost Recovery Program for solar, we're urging legislators to consider wind as an important emerging source of distributed generation, jobs, and wealth for Washingtonians. Please contact your legislators and ask them to strengthen and extend the state incentive for distributed wind!

We in California are obviously suffering from a severe drought, and everyone in the state needs to do something significant. As agriculture, industry, and mining--including oil and gas drilling--use by far the most water, they need to do the most. Reduced showers, lawn irrigation and the like can only alleviate a small part of the water shortage. Governor Brown needs to require actual reduction of water use by those who use the most water and can reduce their use without undue hardship, by using watering fields at times least likely to result in evaporation and installing drip systems on an expedited basis.

DWEA is supporting a rural small business, land-owner and farmer refundable tax credit of 30% or $50,000, whichever is less, for capital and installation costs of small scale renewable energy projects (small wind, micro-hydro and biomass) for rural electric co-operative and municipal utility customers. ● The installation must meet the requirements of Colorado's net-metering laws and interconnection standards for the type of utility that serves the customer. This credit is available to a variety of technologies – including small wind, micro-hydro, biomass, geothermal and more. ● Tax credit is available for taxable years beginning in 2015 through December 31, 2018. ● Refundable Income Tax Credit is up to $50,000 or 30%, whichever is less. ● Program is capped at $1 million/yr and is available to Coloradans on a first/come – first/serve basis.

Dear Friends, We in New York City have an amazing opportunity to substantially reduce the use of the world's most widely used throwaway product--the single-use shopping bag. New Yorkers currently use 10 billion carryout bags a year, which costs the city $12.5 million annually to dispose of. Reducing bag use is the low hanging fruit in transforming the throwaway-economy that is wrecking our habitat. The great news is that the City Council has introduced a bill to reduce the amount of single-use bags in New York City by mandating that stores charge a small 10-cent fee for each carryout bag provided to a customer. Customers can avoid this fee simply by refusing a carryout bag or bringing their own bag. Last month, over 70 environmental and community organizations sent letters to the Mayor de Blasio and City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito urging them to pass the bag bill by Earth Day. Now we need your help: Sign the petition below to let the Mayor and Speaker know that you support this initiative! We've all seen plastic bags caught in trees in our neighborhoods and littering the sidewalks, and it has to stop. This bill will have a positive impact on our environment and is fair to all New Yorkers. We need your support now to make sure the bill is passed by Earth Day. Spread the word: #byobag by #earthday!

New York is in the midst of a landmark Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) process, including reorientation of NYSERDA's programs. The small wind industry has been actively participating in the REV proceeding and has been impressed by its breadth and ambition. We expect that certain of the REV initiatives – such as community net metering, community choice aggregation, valuing distributed generation in new utility tariffs, and demonstration projects could provide new exciting opportunities for the small wind industry in New York. However, we need to maintain momentum until these REV initiatives are in place, and not disrupt business opportunities in New York to the point where there is no small wind industry to take advantage of the new REV framework. For this reason, we strongly urge you to support continuation of on-site wind incentives, in some form, in the near-term, to avoid a cliff in the small wind industry. A cliff for small wind will disrupt our trajectory towards grid parity, which is the goal for distributed wind, like other distributed generation technologies. DWEA had previously suggested a program modeled after NY-Sun in meetings with NYSERDA and DPS. Like solar, a system of declining incentives based on the amount of megawatts deployed would provide a long-term signal to the industry and a strong incentive to continue to reduce costs. Further, achieving scale will itself reduce costs as customer acquisition, design and construction, and permitting costs come down due to economies of scale. Note: If appropriate please include your company name in the comment or address field.

California is in a water crisis — yet recent water restrictions mandated by Governor Brown are inadequate. While we support individual efforts to conserve, it's clear that the severity of this drought calls for much more than just individual action (residential use accounts for less than 15% of water use in the state). It's time for Governor Brown to take bold action to stop wasteful and unreasonable uses by corporate agriculture, oil interests and the bottled water industry. Big Ag: Big agribusiness is over-pumping California's precious groundwater, especially the water-guzzling almond empire that has doubled in size in the driest part of the state over the last five years. But Governor Brown’s mandate places little burden and no new restrictions on agriculture. Big Oil: Not only does fracking and drilling use tens of millions of gallons of water a year, but the oil and gas industry has been dumping toxic waste water into California's aquifers. This toxic practice needs to end today. Bottled Water Companies: While restaurants will only serve drinking water upon request, water bottling giants like Nestlé continue to suck the state dry. California’s groundwater (that is, the water that exists in our natural aquifers underground) is considered private property and is not treated as the public resource it is. This means that corporations can use it up with little to no restrictions, leading to extreme over-pumping and depleting the state’s already dwindling aquifers. We need real and meaningful action to save our water now!

The Distributed Wind Energy Association (DWEA) is pursuing legislation in the current Iowa legislative session to provide an incentive program for small wind that mirrors the tax incentives provided for solar. Senators Rob Hogg and Joe Bolkcom continue to construct the Senate's omnibus renewable energy bill. With a finite amount of money to utilize, it is shaping up to be a fight to the finish to see who can make it into and stay in the bill. In addition to signing onto the petition, please directly email each of the Senate Ways and Means Committee members listed below (firstname.lastname @legis.iowa.gov) and ask them to please support the establishment of an Iowa small scale wind assistance program similar to the one currently in place for solar energy. Sen. Joe Bolkcom Sen. Chaz Allen Sen. Randy Feenstra Sen. Bill Anderson Sen. Jerry Behn Sen. Michael Breitbach Sen. Bill Dotzler Sen. Robb Hogg Sen. Pam Jochum Sen. Matt McCoy Sen. Janet Petersen Sen. Herman Quirmbach Sen. Jason Schultz Sen. Joe Seng Sen. Roby Smith Note: If appropriate, please include your company name in the petition sign-on's comment field.

Many of us fear trace amounts of pesticides in our food, but sit on sofas every day that contain pounds of toxic flame retardants. These chemicals migrate out of our sofas and other household products and are released into the air in our homes. As a result, 97 percent of U.S. residents have measurable quantities of toxic flame retardants in their blood. Take action today to urge the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to protect the public from toxic flame retardants. These chemicals have been associated with reproductive impairment; neurological impacts, including learning deficits and decreased IQ in children; endocrine disruption; cancer; and immune disorders. Children’s products in particular are likely to contain flame retardant chemicals, putting kids at risk during critical periods of rapid growth and brain development. And for reasons that are not fully understood, low-income communities and communities of color bear a higher body burden of these chemicals than others. To make matters worse, household products containing toxic flame retardants can still burn, and when they do, they tend to produce more smoke, soot, toxic gases, and carcinogenic combustion products. This puts building residents, firefighters, and other first responders at greater risk of harm in the event of a fire. Earthjustice and Consumer Federation of America, representing a broad coalition of organizations, just submitted a legal petition to the CPSC, asking it to protect the public by prohibiting the sale of any children’s product, piece of furniture, or mattress if it contains a toxic flame retardant, and any electronic product with toxic flame retardants in the plastic enclosure. Please let the CPSC know that you stand with the firefighters, pediatricians, consumer advocates, and scientists in asking for household products free of toxic flame retardants!

Currently, the limits on the number of Atlantic herring that can be caught are benefiting industrial fishing operations but threatening the Northeast’s ocean ecosystem. We need you to come to the rescue by taking urgent action now. The New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) is in the early stages of developing a policy to change the way catch limits are set for Atlantic herring, a keystone species in the marine ecosystem and an important food source for whales, seabirds, and bigger fish, such tuna and cod. The Council needs to hear from people who care about the ocean ecosystem, not just from the herring fishing industry. Earthjustice has been fighting for more than a decade to protect our oceans from irresponsible fishing practices, pollution, and habitat destruction. Today, we need your help. Act now: Tell New England fisheries managers that Atlantic herring are critically important to the ocean, not just to the fishing industry’s bottom line. Other councils have recognized that forage fish need to be managed differently than other fish. Many marine species that depend on herring for food are struggling after long periods of overfishing and ecosystem disruption. New England managers must ensure that enough herring are left in the ocean—at the right time and in the right locations—to give these herring predators enough to eat and sustain their populations. Herring predators aren’t just ecologically important; they also have economic value. Tuna fishing, commercial and recreational fishing for cod and striped bass, whale and seabird watching—all these activities contribute to the Northeast’s economy. The NEFMC should consider this economic value and recognize that these activities depend on an abundant source of Atlantic herring. Take action: Urge the New England Council to protect herring for the long-term health of the ecosystem and the Northeast economy!