Practical Pathways for Port Decarbonization/Environmental Justice: Environmental Defense Fund Guidance Addressing U.S. Ports/Partners

The Environmental Defense Fund and Arup have issued a report titled:

                                Practical Pathways for Port Decarbonization and Environmental Justice

                                Guidance for U.S. Ports and their Partners (“Report”)

The authors of the Report include:

• Ellu Nasser
• Dana Rodriguez
• Fern Uennatornwaranggoon
• Ken Adler
• Mark Button
• Amy Leitch
• Elizabeth Joyce
• Hannah Wilson

The Report addresses some Unites States port objectives such as:

• Net zero-emissions to increase decarbonization ambition.
• Encouraging accountability to port-adjacent environmental justice communities.

The federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act are cited as opportunities for United States ports to access funding to upgrade infrastructure to accelerate zero-emission transition. Further noted is the federal government Justice40 initiative which ensures that 40% of project benefits are targeted for historically disadvantaged environmental justice communities.

The stated purpose of the report is to promote United States port programming changes and investments on and off terminals that support:

• Zero-greenhouse gas supply chains.
• Zero-greenhouse gas transportation.
• Zero-greenhouse gas energy systems.
• Environmental justice.

To accomplish this, the Report identifies:

• High-potential energy points.
• Federal infrastructure funding opportunities.
• Ways to enhance competitiveness for government funding.

The guide describes its key elements as:

• Provides a landscape scan on current U.S. progress for port decarbonization and EJ.
• Introduces the key drivers for why ports can and should lead climate action.
• Lays out a comprehensive framework for decarbonization.
• Provides a list of actions, metrics and key outcomes across each action-area for ports to measure their progress on net zero goals with environmental justice opportunity call outs.

A copy of the Report can be downloaded here.