New York’s Push To Criminalize Climate Policy Could Devastate the Empire State’s Economy

As a New Yorker, you know what environmental damage looks like.From the Love Canal to Superstorm Sandy and Hurricane Irene, all of which devastated New York, we’ve seen how bad it can get. Holding powerful actors accountable when they enable such damage isn’t radical — it’s necessary. That’s why a new bill at Albany proposing to criminally prosecute corporate executives who “knowingly” risk catastrophic environmental harm is getting attention. Yet attention isn’t the same thing as good policy. The proposed legislation, sponsored by Senator Michelle Hinchey and Assemblymember Emily Gallagher, would extend New York’s penal law to cover corporate executives whose business decisions create a risk of what the bill calls “catastrophe” to the environment. Sounds good. But who gets to define what “catastrophe” is? Prosecuting a building owner who blatantly ignores a red-tagged wall is not the same thing as prosecuting an executive for running a utility that governments permitted, regulated, and relied on for decades. One is clear-cut negligence; the other criminalizes an entire economic era because of a distaste for fossil fuels. For decades, New York has used the latter to heat homes, power subways, and run its hospitals. Regulators have authorized pipelines and issued permits. Legislators have made tax policy. Pension funds have invested in energy companies. In 2024, natural gas was responsible for more than half of our state’s electricity generation, twice that of any other energy source. Without fossil fuels, New York couldn’t run. Yet this new bill would put natural gas companies at the mercy of the penal system for daring to provide a product that New Yorkers widely use. Even if fossil fuels have led to some environmental harm, they’re getting cleaner, and responsibility does not rest neatly on a handful of executives. Criminal law is supposed to be precise. The real danger in this legislation isn’t that it demands accountability; it’s that it hands prosecutors enormous discretion to decide what counts as criminal catastrophe risk. If prosecutors are empowered to decide that operating within an industry long sanctioned by state and federal governments amounts to criminal catastrophe risk, where does that logic end? Energy companies today — utilities tomorrow? Construction firms next? Financial institutions that finance infrastructure? New York has some of the highest energy costs in the nation and, in 2019, the state legislature already enacted an unrealistic climate law which seeks to force dramatic change in our energy mix. The state also banned natural gas extraction and stopped construction of gas pipelines, all in the name of protecting the climate. Now, Governor Kathy Hochul is asking the state legislature to roll back the climate law because its goals are unattainable. It’s easy to understand why: Energy officials in New York just stated that compliance with that law will increase gasoline by approximately $2.23 per gallon and require most homeowners to pay $4,000 more to heat their homes with heating oil or natural gas. Instead of accepting these facts and reversing course, legislators like Ms. Hinchey and Ms. Gallagher want to double down and expose energy executives to potential criminal sanctions. If this idea becomes law, companies will assuredly cease making investments to finance improvements to New York’s electric generation and grid infrastructure — or they will do so at a significantly slower pace. Lenders, insurers, and investors price risk aggressively. Stack criminal exposure on top of that, and the risk may be too high. Working families would see this priced into their electric bills and through projects that never break ground. This bill is grounded in political rhetoric that sounds less like honest environmentalism and more like prosecuting participation in the market system. New Yorkers shouldn’t embrace a political philosophy that uses prosecution to re-litigate the very existence of capitalism. To be sure, no one is above the law. If corporations lied to investors, hid material risks, or broke environmental laws, prosecute them. If they lied to regulators, prosecute them for fraud. Civil penalties, disclosure requirements, and prospective regulations are all legitimate and powerful tools. Such laws are already on the books. Yet allowing such an expansion of criminal liability, where the dividing line between economic legality and political ideology becomes blurred, will have serious negative repercussions for our state. New York legislators have already made a muddle of our energy supply system, making brownouts and energy supply failures all too likely. Injecting criminal penalties for normal business activities will surely make matters even worse. Climate ideology should never become the basis of criminal law prosecutions. The state legislature should just say no.

New York’s Push To Criminalize Climate Policy Could Devastate the Empire State’s Economy

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