PoliticoPro: New York weakened its climate law. Now comes the hard part.
June 24th, 2026
Gov. Kathy Hochul has more time to make difficult decisions about reducing emissions, but the state’s energy battles are far from settled.
By: Marie J. French | 06/24/2026 – Read at PoliticoPro
ALBANY, New York — Gov. Kathy Hochul’s success in weakening New York’s climate law will have a cascading impact on the state’s energy policies.
The changes Hochul secured in the budget shift the battlefield for environmental advocates, utilities, power generators and large energy users and spark a new round of regulatory fights. The governor’s push gives her administration more time and flexibility to determine how to move away from fossil fuels.
The statutory 2030 emissions reduction goal is no longer enforceable, the 2040 benchmark is more of a guidepost than a mandatory target and regulations to slash pollution aren’t due until the end of 2028.
Environmental groups, still reeling from the bitter defeat in the budget fight, seem to be largely pinning their hopes on that 2028 deadline. They’re pushing to get a cap-and-trade-style program to put a price on pollution and invest revenues in clean energy priorities as soon as possible.
“We’re going to have to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and make sure that the 2028 program is as strong as it possibly can be,” said Evergreen Action’s Justin Balik.
But disputes over the best path forward for the energy system are guaranteed to continue as New York grapples with reliability concerns to meet growing energy demand driven by large-scale data centers and the electrification of cars and buildings.
Concerns about affordability ahead of November’s elections — with every state lawmaker and the governor on the ballot — also loom large.
President Donald Trump’s administration has been beating the drum on the need for more pipelines across New York to lower energy costs and Republicans have railed against Albany’s “green energy scam.”
Hochul’s successful push to weaken the climate law has not halted those attacks.
Here are five major issues to keep an eye on in the coming months:
1. Cap and invest isn’t going anywhere
The climate law changes trigger a lot of homework for Hochul’s agencies. One of the first items will likely be updated regulations from the Department of Environmental Conservation setting emissions limits under the revised law.
“To the extent the state is still thinking about regulatory programs like cap and invest, they’ve got to know what they’re solving for,” said Jon Binder, executive director of the Model Climate Laws Initiative, a joint initiative of the Columbia University’s Sabin Center and Environmental Advocates NY.
DEC is also likely to revise regulations requiring companies to report their greenhouse gas emissions to the state to align with the new law. Those regulations have faced legal challenges from industry and Republican state attorneys general.
A new round of policy discussions will also kick off at the Climate Action Council, whose reconvening was delayed by a year and now must update the state’s climate plans by 2028. That’s also the deadline for regulations — likely a cap-and-trade-style program — to start making progress on the 2040 goal. Environmental groups will be pushing for swift action.
“Now that we’ve made these changes, we need to move this forward as quickly as possible to get this economywide program stood up,” said Julie Tighe, president of the New York League of Conservation Voters.
Hochul’s administration is expected to do more modeling on costs and engagement with the public. The potential impacts on households will be a major focus, since that was the main concern Hochul raised in revising the climate law’s deadlines and restrictive language.
“We still need to have a better understanding of the price tags associated with this amended plan,” said Justin Wilcox, executive director of Upstate United, a business group.
2. Natural gas is the big winner
The climate law rewrite largely aligned New York’s accounting method for emissions with other states. The changes — eliminating upstream emissions from the extraction and transportation of fossil fuels burned in New York and calculating the warming impact over a longer time period — effectively make reducing the combustion of natural gas less urgent to achieve the state’s goals.
“Natural gas is going to appear far less impactful under the new accounting,” Binder said “It’s going to make it easier for them to fuel switch to gas and repower with gas.”
The shift will have a host of downstream effects.
It could make approving repowered gas power plants and pipelines appear less problematic for the state’s climate goals. Gas utilities will need to revise their long-term plans for reducing emissions by using the updated accounting method, likely reducing the pace of electrification efforts.
3. Biofuels also get a boost
The changes to the law didn’t move toward “net” emissions accounting, which could have counted some biofuels as negative emissions for avoiding the release of planet-warming gases directly into the atmosphere.
The 60 percent reduction by 2040 and the 85 percent reduction by 2050 goals, both from 1990 levels, are gross targets.
But the revised law does effectively count carbon dioxide emissions from the combustion of “biogenic” fuels — like renewable diesel and renewable natural gas — as zero for the gross emissions totals. Previously, burning renewable natural gas produced from cow manure or captured landfill gas was treated nearly the same as conventional natural gas.
There’s still some details to be worked out about how those fuels will be counted by the Department of Environmental Conservation, which could take some time.
But overall it’s a clear win for industry groups supporting biofuel use and could reinvigorate the push for a low carbon fuel standard in transportation. That would put fees on higher-emitting fuels and incentivize greater use of biofuels and electric vehicles.
“New York’s decision to stop going alone isn’t moving the goalposts in our minds. It’s recognizing we can’t let perfect be the enemy of the good, so it helps us create the kind of biofuels market that’s working on the West Coast,” said Rocco Lacertosa, CEO of the New York State Energy Coalition, a group representing home heating oil companies in New York City and on Long Island.
His group supports a clean fuel standard for transportation and, eventually, heating fuels.
Natural gas utilities that have long supported renewable natural gas as an option to reduce carbon emissions will also look to boost its role in their plans.
4. Pipelines galore
New Yorkers for Affordable Energy, a group representing fossil fuel companies and some labor unions, immediately signaled a pivot to pushing for new pipelines after securing changes to the climate law.
Trump administration officials have launched a full-court press in advocating for the Constitution Pipeline, which would bring more gas into New York. The project is seeking federal approvals.
Supporters of the project argue it would ease constraints that lead to higher gas prices in the Northeast, blunting volatile spikes during cold snaps.
The climate law still requires consideration of the state’s long-term emissions reduction goals when permitting projects. But some environmentalists see the increasing federal pressure for a new pipeline across New York as a consequence of the climate law changes.
“New York has demurred on its renewable energy commitments, it has delayed regulating polluters, it has eased restrictions and standards for natural gas emissions, and it has all the while cried out alarm bells about energy supply,” said Vanessa Fajans-Turner, executive director of Environmental Advocates NY.
“That left a big opening for pipeline companies and the fossil-fuel-run Trump administration to see New York as a new frontier for its pursuits, with a renewed zeal — and I think that’s a direct consequence of what the governor and the Legislature did this session,” she added.
Hochul’s administration has been fighting the Constitution pipeline’s efforts to avoid state permitting requirements, but she also green-lighted a new downstate pipeline even before the changes to the climate law.
5. Electric sector targets unchanged
Hochul didn’t change the state’s ambitious targets for electric generation: 70 percent renewables by 2030 and zero emissions by 2040. However, the state’s Public Service Commission is reviewing the possibility of delaying those goals under existing statutory off-ramps amid mounting reliability concerns.
The state isn’t on track to meet the 2030 target, with not enough renewables in the pipeline to get there on schedule. The 2040 target is also challenging, particularly since the PSC hasn’t defined “zero emissions” yet and the state is still heavily reliant on an aging fleet of fossil fuel power plants.
Hochul is focused on ensuring reliability and growing energy supply, with her administration cracking the door more widely to repowering natural gas plants and building new nuclear energy.
Environmentalists will likely oppose any new gas investments. But the climate law’s additional openness to biofuels could make permitting new gas plants that could commit to running on that fuel in the future easier.
“Energy affordability concerns, reliability issues can be solved overnight, right, if the Public Service Commission recognizes new nuclear plants, renewable natural gas, thermal energy networks, clean hydrogen as zero emission power generation,” said NYS Pipe Trades President Ed Nadeau.