Colorado Roadmap 2.0 Falls Short of its Fundamental Rationale: Charting a Course to Meet State Pollution Reduction Goals

(Boulder, Colo. — Feb 27, 2024) In response to the release of the Polis administration’s Greenhouse Gas Pollution Reduction Roadmap 2.0, Environmental Defense Fund, Western Resource Advocates and Sierra Club released the following statement:

“Governor Polis’s Roadmap 2.0 presents an opportunity to chart a course for sustained climate leadership through 2030 and beyond. The state’s continued, and rightfully earned, status as a national climate leader hinges on its ability to meet the promises leaders have made for a stronger climate future in Colorado. While the updated roadmap would move the state closer to its targets, it is not designed for the task at hand: meeting Colorado’s legislatively-mandated climate pollution reduction goals.

“We are at a critical moment. According to Colorado’s own analysis in Roadmap 2.0 and elsewhere, the state remains off-track from its near-term targets, poised to miss its 2025 greenhouse gas pollution reduction goal next year and with little time to correct course on its 2030 goal. Colorado is in a position to miss its climate goals after implementation of the first roadmap, which relied heavily on incentives and voluntary actions — an approach that is not delivering on the hoped-for results. The state’s updated “baseline” scenario shows the state is not only off-track from its targets, but is also behind its own previous projections for where emissions would be today. Banking on a similar uncertain approach — without directly limiting pollution across major emitting sectors — is likely to continue leaving the state short of its emissions reduction estimates, and short of the results that are needed.

“Five years after Colorado first passed nation-leading climate goals into law, the state is still missing the most critical part of an actual roadmap to meet our climate goals: a concrete regulatory agenda capable of cutting pollution at the speed and scale required by law. With Colorado’s climate future at stake, stronger leadership is needed to deliver on the climate action Coloradans have demanded.”