Michigan

Detroit’s first-of-its-kind Community Benefits Ordinance (CBO) offers lessons for governments, developers, community organizations, and others planning or already undertaking a community benefits process. Detroit’s CBO has started to level the playing field between communities and developers by giving community members a seat at the table in conversations on development. However, a CBO is not a silver bullet for addressing decades of disinvestment, austerity, and racial and economic inequality in Detroit and elsewhere, and interviewees from community-based organizations and neighborhood advisory councils (NACs) voiced several concerns about the CBO’s community engagement and benefits agreement processes and outcomes. To strengthen Detroit’s CBO and provide for equitable economic development and a just energy transition, this report recommends sufficiently resourcing communities to negotiate with developers, building representative coalitions, ensuring that agreements have robust monitoring and enforcement mechanisms to hold developers accountable, incorporating environmental justice and racial equity frameworks to assess project impacts and benefits delivery, and undertaking analysis of public ownership of key infrastructure projects to serve the public good.

A large majority (63-78%) of Michigan local officials say authority over renewable energy planning and zoning should be completely under local government. Another 13-25% say authority should be primarily local, with some role for the state. Meanwhile, less than 10% say authority should be either mostly or completely with the state government. Local government leaders are most strongly opposed to state involvement regarding where renewable energy projects belong in a community (zoning) and regarding the parameters for renewable energy projects, such as required setbacks from property lines and allowable sound levels. On the other hand, they are more likely to say the state should have at least some authority in determining whether a community should have any renewable energy projects (32%) and whether a community should have large renewable energy projects (28%).

Michigan’s future includes lower monthly energy costs, the freedom to live without pollution, and more good-paying jobs and a growing middle class. Michigan’s economy is surging, supercharged by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and a suite of nation-leading clean energy bills passed by the Michigan state government last November. Michigan now has more clean energy projects than any other state and is ranked fourth in the country for new clean energy jobs. Clean energy businesses, which are creating jobs and growing the state’s workforce, are the first to say it: They are planting their stakes in Michigan, largely thanks to strong climate policies. The latest analysis from 5 Lakes Energy (PDF) shows that the state’s climate legislation package, in tandem with the IRA, goes way beyond cutting climate pollution. It will create economy-wide change by saving Michigan families hundreds of dollars in energy bills, bringing more clean energy jobs and investments into the state, and protecting communities from the harmful effects of pollution.

This post includes climate and environment headlines, data points, and key takeaways from recent public polls - including new national polling on climate change as an issue priority for voters and new polling in Michigan about the state’s energy policies.

Michigan voters have much more positive attitudes toward the clean energy industry than the fossil fuel industry, and want the state to hold oil and gas companies more accountable for their pollution. Around four in five voters in the state have favorable attitudes about solar (81% favorable / 14% unfavorable) and wind (79% favorable / 17% unfavorable) as energy sources. Republicans in the state also have overwhelmingly positive attitudes about both energy sources, with around seven in ten Republicans saying that they feel favorably about solar (73% favorable / 21% unfavorable) and wind (70% favorable / 25% unfavorable). Around three-quarters of voters feel favorably about clean energy companies (73% favorable / 20% unfavorable), including three in five Republicans (61% favorable / 31% unfavorable). Meanwhile, only half of voters in the state have favorable attitudes about fossil fuel companies (50% favorable / 38% unfavorable). Most voters in the state (58%) say that oil and gas companies have a negative impact on air quality for Michigan communities, and around half also say that these fossil fuel companies are negatively impacting water quality (51%) and public health (48%) in Michigan.

This post includes climate and environment headlines, data points, and key takeaways from recent public polls - including new national polling on energy policy, the factors behind people’s climate views, and electric vehicles + new polling in Michigan on energy issues and the state’s climate plan.