Preserve the environment AND jobs
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Rhode
Island, challenges the EPA’s decision to terminate all funding for the
Solar for All program. Local attorneys representing the Lawyers’
Committee for Rhode Island, Southern Environmental Law Center, Lawyers
for Good Government, and the Conservation Law Foundation filed
the suit.
Plaintiffs include the RI AFL-CIO, which was relying on Solar for All to expand renewable and cheaper power while ensuring high-quality union careers for a new generation. RI AFL-CIO invested time and money in developing training and apprenticeship programs to increase the implementation of solar energy.
The RI Center for Justice is also joining the
challenge as a nonprofit working to lower the high cost of electricity for
low-income consumers and to provide sustainable, uninterrupted access to vital
electricity in their homes by preventing their utilities from being shut off.
“Solar energy is key to Rhode Island’s march towards a carbon-free economy. The Solar for All program is critical to meeting the mandates of the Act on Climate and could lead to hundreds of good-paying union jobs. That is why the Rhode Island AFL-CIO is happy to join this court action,” said Patrick Crowley, President of the Rhode Island AFL-CIO. “Our members want this program back up and running as soon as possible.”
“Our clients are struggling with unaffordable electric bills and facing a cycle of shut-offs that puts the health and safety of utility customers, including those who are elderly and living with disabilities, at risk,” said Jennifer L. Wood, Executive Director of Rhode Island Center for Justice.
“Affordable access to solar is vital as part of the
long-term solution to meeting the Act on Climate goals in
Rhode Island while not leaving low-income Rhode Islanders behind. We need this
program reinstated so our clients can be included in the benefits of solar
energy ‘for all.’”
“Congress designed Solar for All grants to give local front-line communities the tools to lower household energy costs and ensure high-quality careers for a new generation with clean, renewable energy,” said Amy R. Romero, Chief Legal Counsel of Lawyers’ Committee for Rhode Island.
“EPA’s unlawful termination halts the creation of hundreds of
union jobs in Rhode Island, and then compounds the risk of utility shutoff and
perpetuates energy security in the very low-income households that Congress
sought to protect with this program. The Lawyers’ Committee for Rhode Island,
along with its colleagues, has brought suit against the federal government to
enforce the law enacted by Congress and ensure Rhode Islanders receive what Congress
intended.”
Before EPA’s abrupt termination of the Solar for All program in August 2025, the EPA obligated $7 billion in grant funding that Congress had directed to provide to states, territories, tribal governments, municipalities, and nonprofits across the country to develop long-lasting solar energy programs for low-income and disadvantaged communities.
According to the EPA, the average low-income household benefiting from the Solar for All grant program would have saved about $400 each year from their electricity bills. Programs funded by Solar for All would have created hundreds of thousands of good-paying, high-quality jobs all across the country.
Additionally, the EPA estimated that
the Solar for All program would have cumulatively reduced or avoided greenhouse
gas emissions by over 30 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, equal to the
emissions of over seven million passenger vehicles.
While a subsequent Congress repealed large parts of
the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, it explicitly did not repeal the
Solar for All program retroactively, rescinding only “unobligated balances.”
Yet instead of distributing the Solar for All funds as Congress mandated, the
EPA unlawfully announced the termination of the Solar for All program, which
will result in the loss of access to affordable solar energy in nearly a
million low-income households and the loss of good-paying, high-quality jobs,
especially in the low-income and disadvantaged communities that Congress
intended these funds to benefit.
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