Thu, March 3, 2016
6:00 PM – 8:30 PM PST
SOLD OUT

LOCATION:
The Mark
1623 19th Street
Bakersfield, CA 93301

California, home to America’s car culture as well as its most ambitious climate change policies, is experimenting with a new future for energy. Gov. Jerry Brown hopes to cut gas consumption in half by 2030 with government mandates and financial incentives to make cars and trucks more efficient and get more people out of their vehicles. Meanwhile, utilities are required to get 50 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2030 and to build thousands of power stations around the state for more than 1.5 million new electric cars. These changes and others will reshape California’s economy and its celebrated lifestyle. Success could mean the world’s eighth largest economy removes tons of greenhouse gas from the atmosphere and that California companies develop innovations that create local jobs and a new global market. Many of these experiments, however, are unprecedented, costly and uncertain.

This panel discussion will describe the policy landscape ahead and hear key perspectives from the state legislature, environmentalists and energy sector leaders. They will explain what we have learned nearly a decade after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the landmark Global Warming Solutions Act. And they will share their thoughts about how climate change policy is changing life in California and the way we do business.


6:30 – 7:00pm Reception and Registration

7:00 – 8:30 Panel Discussion

Welcome: Richard Beene, publisher, Bakersfield Californian

Panelists

  • Moderator: David Lesher, editor, CALmatters
  • Sen. Jean Fuller (R-Bakersfield)
  • Cathy Reheis-Boyd, president, Western States Petroleum Assn
  • Todd Strauss, senior director of planning and analysis, PG&E
  • Paul Gipe, author/alternative energy advocate

Organized by CALmatters and the Bakersfield Californian

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John Osborn D’Agostino is an award-winning data journalist, web developer and game designer. Previously, he's worked with The Hechinger Report, EdSource, the East Bay Express, Berkeleyside, and the North...