We are proud to work in the rapidly growing solar and wind industries here in Colorado as directors of corporate development/communications and procurement. We are both also in the early stages of our careers in the clean economy, so we have a lot at stake for the stability and opportunities we will experience in our lives. The next few years are critical.

Colorado has done much to be proud of on climate action and is becoming a model for other states and the federal government to follow. By law, Colorado must reduce carbon pollution 26% by 2025 and 50% by 2030, from 2005 levels. We’ve been encouraged by the commitments enumerated in Gov. Jared Polis’ Greenhouse Gas Reduction Roadmap released in January 2021, which the governor’s administration developed to move us toward a pollution-free and innovative economy.

Colorado’s business leaders are ready to help drive our collective recovery and transition to a sustainable economy.

But we need more action and direction from our governor, legislature and Air Quality Control Commission on how these big decisions will play out. We emerge from the COVID pandemic at a moment of tremendous change and opportunity, with the greatest social, economic and infrastructural transition in a generation already underway: the transition to the clean energy economy.

We’re pleased to see a new bill, SB21-200, which will lay out new verifiable and equitable tools to implement the Roadmap’s sector-defined pollution-reduction goals, by providing timely sector-specific rule makings. These rule makings will provide more deadlines, but also the certainty businesses need around how we plan to meet our state science-based climate goals while protecting our communities, especially frontline communities, from the impact of climate change.

This bill, if it becomes law, will be an important tool in the toolbox for Gov. Polis to use in achieving the goals laid out in the GHG Reduction Roadmap.

This bill is not about “hard caps.” Instead, it provides important flexibility to meet the sector-specific targets by allowing the Air Quality Control Commission to change the sector-specific targets where it’s more cost-effective, as long as we still attain the overall emission goals. The only mandate in this bill is to achieve our climate goals — the end result, not the way we get there.

This bill also aligns with the ongoing utility resource planning processes.

While Colorado utilities have been making commitments and announcing plans to reduce emissions, many of those commitments are voluntary, and there is no guarantee that most of our electricity providers will meet those targets. We know, Coloradans want aggressive climate action.

We look forward to working with legislators and leaders like House Speaker Alec Garnett and Senate President Leroy Garcia as well as Gov. Polis and his administration on advancing climate policy through the Roadmap implementation process.

We encourage legislators to vote yes on SB21-200 and support moving forward.

Meeting our climate and statewide pollution reduction goals will help us drive growth and innovation toward a clean energy economy, with certainty. Colorado can and must continue to lead on climate.

Janna West-Heiss is director of communications and corporate development at Solaris Energy. Frances Cook is director of procurement for a Colorado wind energy company. Both are members of the Mountain West chapter of the national, nonpartisan business group E2 (Environmental Entrepreneurs).