States can also influence industries by cracking down on manufacturing practices. North Carolina and Virginia, for example, have become hubs for biomass companies, whose business model is to cut down forests and convert the trees into wood pellets. Most of the pellets are then shipped to Europe, where they are used in power plants, as an alternative to fossil fuels. This is an unwise practice, not only because of deforestation, but also because wood is often a dirtier form of energy than coal.

Enviva, the world’s largest biomass company, owned four plants in North Carolina before declaring bankruptcy earlier this year. Many other biomass companies still operate there. The State has would have given that the industry has received at least $10 million in grants over the years — and Drew Ball, NRDC’s southeast campaigns director, sees that as a potential pressure point. “It’s a market supported by subsidies,” he said. “These false solutions need to be put under the microscope. »

In TNR’s interviews with activists, a common theme was that these state-level policies can provide new opportunities for organizing, even in polarized environments. No one likes cronyism, and conservatives can sometimes be persuaded that subsidies to inefficient industries are a bad idea. Likewise, conservatives are increasingly convinced by renewable energy as it becomes cheaper, and Republican voters can often be enlisted to fight new industrial projects that threaten to pollute their land, water and air – especially as the effects of climate change become more pronounced. pronounced. In fact, local environmental issues have often served as a gateway to activism for people who had never engaged much in politics before.