Meet the Interagency Climate Change Task Force
The Climate Change Task Force is led by the Departments of Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources and Environment Department. The Task Force is comprised of nine smaller, interagency Climate Action Teams responsible for proposing, planning, and implementing strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and enhance New Mexico’s ability to adapt to climate change.
Clean and Efficient Electricity and Buildings
This team works to implement strategies that facilitate the growth of renewable energy resources in New Mexico to meet the goals of the 2019 Energy Transition Act and ensure clean energy growth in the state benefits residents. It also implements strategies to increase energy efficiency in buildings across New Mexico. Energy efficiency reduces energy consumption and emissions and saves residents and businesses money on utility bills.
Transportation Decarbonization
The Transportation Decarbonization team is working across agencies to identify and implement ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector.
Industrial and Oil and Gas Sector Emissions
The Industrial and Oil and Gas Sector Emissions team is focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from New Mexico’s industry, the largest portion of which come from the oil and gas sector. EO 2019-003 directed both NMED and EMNRD to develop a statewide, enforceable regulatory framework to reduce these emissions. NMED also plans to develop rules to reduce the emissions of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), another potent greenhouse gas.
State Leadership
The State Leadership team advances policies and programs that reduce emissions from New Mexico state agency operations, from increasing efficiency and clean energy in our buildings to purchasing cleaner vehicles and products.
Natural and Working Lands
The Natural and Working Lands team works to identify and implement strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from and increase the sequestration capacity of both natural lands (e.g. forests and grasslands) and working lands (e.g. agriculture).
Economic Transition
This team seeks to support communities experiencing economic hardship as a result of coal transitions and promotes economic diversification, workforce development, and education strategies to ensure job opportunities and economic growth are part of New Mexico’s clean energy transition across the state.
Sustainable Infrastructure and Planning
The Sustainable and Resilient Infrastructure Planning team focuses on reducing emissions associated with our infrastructure and using infrastructure investments to make communities more resilient to the effects of climate change. We can reduce emissions by using less emissions-intensive materials in construction and by planning and building infrastructure in ways that make it easier for residents to walk, bike, or use public transportation instead of driving.
Emergency Management, Health, and Resilience
The Emergency Management, Health, and Resilience team works to identify climate risks that New Mexico’s communities are facing as well as health outcomes they are already experiencing. The team also helps state agencies, local governments and Tribes develop strategies to mitigate those risks. This work will help New Mexico adapt to the climate change already occurring today in addition to our efforts to limit the extent of future change.
This team has three subgroups:
