2026 Legislative Priorities

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2026 Goals for the Alliance for Clean Energy New York

For New York to achieve its affordability, climate and clean energy goals, the clean energy industry needs accelerated investment and construction in all clean energy market segments, including grid-connected renewables, energy storage, distributed renewables, transportation electrification, and building efficiency and electrification. Each has unique challenges but offers significant opportunities to create jobs (and offer other economic benefits) and provide clean lower cost energy, while helping to tackle climate change and reduce air and water pollution from fossil fuels. 

ACE NY PRIORITIES FOR LARGE-SCALE, GRID-CONNECTED RENEWABLES:

• Advocate for predictable NYSERDA competitive procurements in 2026 and beyond to support large-scale solar and wind energy project construction and continued development of a robust pipeline of projects in the state to meet the Climate Law goals.

• Urge the State to continue to improve coordination among different agencies to reduce red tape and bring permitted projects to construction sooner.

• Advocate for efficient permitting, as evidenced by steady progress by the Office of Renewable Energy Siting and Electric Transmission (ORES). Our goal is to allow responsible developers to move steadily and predictably through the process in a timely manner, so that there is a healthy pipeline of diverse projects. Also, advocate for improvements to the species impact mitigation process and wetland permitting.

• Continue to track and monitor the Clean Energy Standard biennial review process to ensure its stated goals are finalized and implemented in a useful way to speed project deployment.

• Continued support of transmission planning and coordination, including engagement in the Coordinated Grid Planning Process (CGPP), NYISO planning processes, and relevant Public Service Commission (PSC) proceedings, to enable onshore and offshore project development.

• Continue to work with NYISO on improvements to the interconnection process, including filings with FERC, if necessary, to ensure that the improvements being implemented work as intended to streamline project interconnections.

• Continue to advocate for solar developers to have the ability to lease land from farmers. Agriculturally compatible solar development that supports the state’s energy and agricultural needs will help the state achieve its clean energy and climate goals. Agrivoltaics presents a promising pathway to achieve New York’s clean energy goals while preserving production on agricultural lands and promoting economic development.

• Support NYISO market design, rules, and methodologies that are fair and favorable for renewables, e.g., capacity or ancillary services market rules that don’t disadvantage renewable energy or storage.

• Strongly recommend that New York remain steadfast in its commitment to developing 9 GWs of offshore wind to support its climate goals and reliability needs. The State must use this time to rebuild its offshore wind procurement process to ensure future solicitations alleviate the significant risk offshore wind developers face, focus on simplified, flexible contracting to guarantee adaptability to the ever-changing landscape, and establish a cost-sharing mechanism through NYSERDA to derisk projects at the earliest stages.

• Strongly support State investments that allow NYSERDA to support targeted, early-stage development activities of offshore wind projects such as pre-permitting or surveying activities, onshore transmission development derisking, and assistance with interconnection costs. If funded now, this will accelerate future projects by years and reduce costs to ratepayers.

• Strongly support the latest NYSERDA Port Infrastructure Request for Proposals – which makes available up to $300 million to support maritime port development and improvement projects that will increase the capability for New York to support the offshore wind industry while also having multi-use purposes.

• Support standardized and fair property taxation of wind and solar projects, and the elimination of unfair renewable energy bans and moratoria at the local level.

• Continued support for a successful competitive Tier 2 program to support renewable resources built before 2015, or another means of support for these projects, plus rules that enable and encourage renewables repowering which can extend the life of a project and, in many cases, increase a project’s power output.

• Advocate for reasonable statewide requirements for the efficient  decommissioning projects and end-of-life disposal rather than town-by-town requirements. Support the development of solar panel recycling facilities in New York.

• Support improved access to public rights-of-way for the purposes of renewable energy transmission cables, particularly with respect to the longitudinal utilization of major highways and parkways.

For energy storage, ACE NY will advocate for the timely release of the second bulk energy storage solicitation, as well as continued funding for a commercial and residential storage program at NYSERDA, towards the achievement of New York’s 6 GW by 2030 goal. We will support rules that facilitate energy storage growth at the New York Independent System Operator (NYISO), especially paired with renewables. And we will advocate for a sales tax exemption for commercial energy storage and ORES permitting for large-scale, stand-alone energy storage projects. These are practical, low-cost policies that will drive progress without sacrificing environmental review or significant state revenues. These measures will reduce ratepayer costs, improve grid reliability, ensure sustainability, and help New York capitalize on federal incentives while they remain available.

For building energy efficiency, ACE NY will participate in the 2030 Energy Efficiency/Building Electrification Portfolio implementation to advocate for utility spending plans that create robust and sustainable markets for building energy efficiency providers. We will also advocate for retaining New York’s all-electric building and strong energy weatherization codes, a system to value efficiency and load reduction effectively, and a better data access framework.  We will continue to participate in the ongoing Grid of the Future and Upgraded Grid Infrastructure Proactive Planning proceedings to ensure appropriate incorporation of storage, efficiency, and vehicle to grid resources and their value to the grid.

For distributed renewables, ACE NY will work in coalition to support and weigh in on improvements to the Value of Distributed Energy Resources (VDER) policy and the calculations within the Marginal Cost of Service.

For transportation electrification, ACE NY will advocate for effective implementation of the PSC’s make-ready order and tariff revisions to support fast charging networks, implementation of the Zero-Emission School Bus provisions, will watchdog implementation of EV-related rules at the Departments of Conservation and Agriculture, and will support passage of legislation that supports transportation electrification, such as the Direct Sales Bill, the Clean Fuel Standard, and the EV Sales Tax Exemption Bill.

At the Legislature, ACE NY will have a full agenda for 2026 and will track all bills that would affect our member companies’ operations and investment in New York.

Finally, continued implementation of the Climate Scoping Plan is a priority for ACE NY in 2026. We will continue to monitor progress and advocate for measures included in the Final Scoping Plan, particularly progress on the economy-wide cap-and-invest policy with an eye to equity and reinvestment in disadvantaged communities.