Q: Where does State Senator Eric Schneiderman stand in terms of environmental issues?

A:

From State Senator Eric Schneiderman's State Senate webpage:

"Energy & the Environment

In 2002, I joined with the environmental advocacy organization, Riverkeeper, and other elected officials and activists, in calling on the Director of the Office of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, to conduct an independent investigation of the security measures and evacuation plans for the Indian Point power plant in the event of a terrorist attack or other emergency. That independent investigation has never taken place. In fact, the in-house drills that have been conducted by Entergy, the company that runs Indian Point, fail to take into account factors such as the gridlock and traffic that people trying to escape a nuclear disaster might cause. Without any assurance that a safe evacuation would be possible in the event of an attack or nuclear fallout, I can not support Indian Point’s upcoming application to renew its license as a nuclear power plant.

In the meantime, I have been working on legislation to promote the use and development of other safer energy sources that will make the power produced by Indian Point unnecessary, as well as making it possible to actual transmit that power to New York City. According to the New York City Energy Policy Task Force, the City will need an increase of 25% more electricity by 2008 to prevent summer brownouts and to provide competitive energy prices. That new electricity needs to come from conservation and new technology, more generation and re-powering of older, more polluting plants, and (because of existing bottlenecks curtailing electricity from going into New York City) more transmission lines, not from Indian Point.

I am the sponsor of Senate Bill 4603, The Clean Energy Development Act, which would establish a Clean Energy Fund to improve energy efficiency and provide for the development of clean air technologies. The legislation would also require all retail electric service providers to provide a minimum percentage of electricity generated by clean air technologies to each customer.

I also sponsored Senate Bill 7032, a bill that would authorize the New York State Power Authority to assist developers trying to build much-needed transmission lines into New York City. As a result of deregulation, developers have found it next to impossible to obtain financial backing for additional transmission lines."

Source: State Senator Eric Schneiderman's website through the State Senate