Los Angeles is abandoning its $5 billion plan to rebuild three aging natural gas-fired power plants, deciding instead to phase out the plants and invest in renewable energy, Reuters reported .

Los Angeles is abandoning its $5 billion plan to rebuild three aging natural gas-fired power plants, deciding instead to phase out the plants and invest in renewable energy, Reuters reported. Mayor Eric Garcetti argued that the new strategy is necessary if the city hopes to achieve its goal of being carbon-neutral by 2050.

“This is the beginning of the end of natural gas in Los Angeles,” Garcetti said in a statement. “The climate crisis demands that we move more quickly to end dependence on fossil fuel, and that’s what today is all about.”

In 2017, Los Angeles got a third of its power from natural gas — 40 percent of which came from the three gas plants now slated to close. The city has been planning for years to renovate the Scattergood, Haynes, and Harbor facilities, which sit along the California coastline, because of a 2010 state law that requires power plants to stop using ocean water for cooling, according to Reuters. Instead, the city will close the facilities by 2029.

Read more at Yale Environment 360

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