Go Ducks!
In another episode of This Weekend in Chelsea’s Adventures finds me off to Eugene for the University of Oregon’s Commencement for the Class of 2026. I’m so proud of my baby for graduating with distinction from the Honors College and the School of Business.
After this, I promise, I won’t keep tempting you each Friday with my upcoming trips! Instead, I am stuck in the sweltering swampland of DC for the time being.
This week’s must read: Congress Has Become a Task Force; It Should Govern Like a Board (Real Clear Energy)
Our friend Alex Flint was published this week with this totally spot on op-ed.
“Congress knows the permitting system is too slow and too vulnerable to litigation and delay. It knows immigration law no longer matches reality. It knows Social Security’s finances need attention. It knows social media and digital assets raise public policy questions that cannot indefinitely be left to regulators, courts, and ad hoc executive action” he writes. “And yet Congress repeatedly responds the same way: more hearings, more debate, more study— but few new laws… Ironically, by trying to manage every detail itself, Congress has weakened rather than strengthened its institutional authority. There is a successful model for a better approach.”
And you’re going to have to read the full piece to find out what his rather brilliant idea is…
Wrapping up the EcoRight Speaks, season 12
Somehow we are here, at the end of season 12. This was perhaps my favorite season of the history of our show. The guests were informative and inspiring. Mostly we stuck to schedule. And I feel like I made some new friends along the way. In fact, I had been envisioning, in lieu of the recap show, a reunion episode featuring a few of my favorites we featured this season. But schedules being schedules, it was hard to get together so instead, in this episode, you will hear me wax poetic about some of these guests.
The highlights: Cora Stryker*** from BrightSaver and Jamie Beard from Project Innerspace, both women leading the public policy drive around innovative renewable energy sources; climate authors Bob Eccles and Norm Leo; Rachel Levine giving us Energy Transmission 101; and PowerHouse Texas’s powerhouse energy leaders, state Reps Erin Zwiener and Drew Darby.
And don’t forget to listen to the end when podcast producer Price Atkinson and I welcome a very special guest to our wrap up sesh…
Coming up next week, a podcast hiatus! (For listeners… on this end, we are busy planning the next season.) We will be back in your ears in July!
***In case you’re keeping track, Connecticut just enacted a balcony solar bill.
[Guest post] On campus sustainability at Weber State University
Our summer intern Livia Payne published her inaugural blog post this week!
A teaser:
A majority-conservative university in the conservative community of Ogden, Weber State has taken a unique approach to sustainability that closely mirrors a traditional EcoRight principle in financial policy. Back in 2007, the university signed the American Colleges and Universities Presidents’ Climate Commitment, pledging to be carbon neutral by 2050 and to develop its Climate Action Plan around the philosophy of “financial return-driven sustainability.” By staying committed to sustainable policies and energy development on campus, they have managed to push their projected date of carbon neutrality forward 10 years to 2040, been awarded the Excellence and Innovation Award for Sustainability and Sustainable Development from the American Association of State Colleges and Universities in 2023, and, most impressively as of 2024, saved 27.3 million dollars in utility costs since 2007.
Read of the rest of the story here!
Bob in the wild
Check out our executive director Bob Inglis, pictured here in Asheville, North Carolina, with the local Kiwanis Club.
Update: Climate Change in the American Mind
Our friends at Mason 4C have an updated report to their ongoing Climate Change in the American Mind series which in its Spring 2026 edition shows that a majority of Americans, sixty-seven percent, think global warming is affecting the cost of living in the United States. Sixty-four percent think climate change is impacting their own cost of living.
Specifically, 66% of registered voters say global warming is increasing the costs of their home utility bills; 61% report an increase in grocery prices; 56% note that car/truck ownership and operation have increased; 51% note an increase in home insurance; 43% in home repair and maintenance; and 35% reported that health care costs have increased.
[Cue: Pomp and Circumstance] I will see you next week from the wilds of the Pacific Northwest!