NEMWI Hosts Webinar on Climate Change in

the Great Lakes

The Northeast-Midwest Institute (NEMWI) hosted a webinar on Climate Change in the Great Lakes on Friday, October 27. This webinar is part of NEMWI’s Great Lakes Primer and Orientation Program, supported by the Erb Family Foundation, which provides in-depth overviews of critical issues impacting the health of the Great Lakes. 

Don Wuebbles, from the University of Illinois’ Discovery Partners Institute, emphasized that climate change is having a massive impact on the Great Lakes region. “It’s not just about temperature change,” Wuebbles said. “Our severe weather is getting more intense, more heatwaves, fewer cold waves, bigger concerns about precipitation coming in larger events.” In the coming century, Wuebbles said, temperatures in the Great Lakes region will rise between 3.2 and 5.4°C, with more days above 90°F, and fewer days under 32°F. The northern latitudes of the Great Lakes region especially are projected to face the brunt of these impacts. The ranges Wuebbles gave for these changes depend on how quickly and aggressively we work to lower emissions. “What emissions we further make determines which of those scenarios we follow, and the likely impacts we’re going to see in the Great Lakes,” Wuebbles concluded.

Alicia Young, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Weather and Climate Portfolio Lead, spoke on NOAA’s data collection in the Great Lakes. She highlighted work that NOAA does through its Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL), as well as through its partner, the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research (CIGLR). Young focused on another impact of climate change in the Great Lakes: ice coverage. “As we have more occurrences of warmer temperatures, we are also seeing an annual reduction of ice coverage,” Young said, referencing data collected over the past 50 years. “In some regions, those declines are on the order of 5-10 days per decade,” she stated. She also noted that annual maximum ice concentration has also decreased by 4 percent per decade for the past half-century. Both of these trends are sure to continue in the future. Looking ahead, Young shared what NOAA is doing to combat climate change in an equitable way. “A first step in that is climate literacy and climate education,” she said. “We do have outreach to tribal nations, we do have outreach across underrepresented and disadvantaged communities.”

Finally, Eric Brown, the Senior Advisor for External Relations for the Great Lakes Commission (GLC), spoke on the GLC’s response to climate change. “In a variable system like we are -- we’re seeing higher highs and lower lows -- our commissioners saw a need to take a regional approach on these issues,” he said. Over the past five years, GLC has increased their work on climate resilience, culminating in the adoption and implementation of the Commission’s Action Plan, which aims to help the Great Lakes region “withstand, adapt to, and recover from climate-related stressors,” with a focus on equity and inclusion. One of the focuses of the GLC’s regional approach is green infrastructure. “By utilizing natural solutions, states and communities are finding ways to reduce flooding, increase water quality, restore native habitat that supports healthy ecosystems, and increase quality of life by helping communities reconnect with nature,” Brown said.

If you missed the webinar, you can watch a recording here.

POLITICO Hosts Discussion of CHIPS and Science Act

POLITICO held a panel discussion regarding the CHIPS and Science Act on Tuesday, October 24. The Act, which was signed into law by President Biden in August 2022, allocated over $50 billion toward U.S. semiconductor manufacturing and fabrication in a bid to bolster the domestic industry. This comes at a time when the industry has declined drastically, from 37 percent of the global share to 12 percent in just two decades. 

The panel was comprised of industry leaders in semiconductor manufacturing and government officials spearheading the initiative and focused on updates regarding the importance of maintaining competitiveness in the semiconductor space as well as concerns around the sustainability of growth. 

Adrienne Elrod, Director of Government Affairs in the CHIPS Program Office, highlighted that a massive outpouring of funding applications, spanning 42 states, demonstrates a strong base of U.S. innovation, a sign that the industry has a lot of potential growth. However, the department has not yet distributed any funds, although they said that they expect to roll out grants in the very near future. 

Manish Bhatia, Executive Vice President at Micron Technology, a U.S. based semiconductor manufacturing company, emphasized the significance of a strong domestic industry. He explained that building the infrastructure required to rival Asian semiconductor clusters would drive economic activity across America on top of bolstering sector strength. He also stressed the need for federal funding to achieve this goal because due to economies of scale, producing semiconductors in the U.S. is between 35 and 45 percent more costly than using manufacturers in Asia. By building up the necessary foundation through government investing, companies like Micron would be able to increase the scope of their productive capabilities and drive costs down. 

Panelists David Isaacs, the Vice President of Government Affairs at the Semiconductor Industry Association, and Shari Liss, Director at SEMI Foundation & Workforce Development Programs, raised potential challenges facing growth. Immigration reform presents a significant barrier to building up U.S. manufacturing capabilities, because although over 460,000 jobs are expected to be created by 2030, almost 58 percent of those are projected to go unfilled. This is due in large part to the inability for experienced members of the field to access visas. Congressional action seems disjointed at best, with many top Republican legislators demanding border security bundled together with any talks of immigration reform. 

Finally, Dr. Michael Spencer, Professor at Morgan State University in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, presented a more long-term challenge. He stressed that a lack of excitement and outreach to underserved communities is creating a shortfall in U.S. STEM education at a foundational level. Furthermore, specific to the semiconductor space, the education, apprenticeship, and internship pipelines that are present in other STEM fields are missing. 

The discussion concluded that while the CHIPS and Science Act presents significant opportunities to regain U.S. competitiveness in a critically important sector, overcoming challenges from domestic policy, economic strategy, and educational foundation perspectives are necessary in overcoming the barriers to growth.

A full recording can be accessed here:

Reported by NEMWI Intern James Li, Brown University

NEMWI Releases Report on Deploying Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund Capital

The Northeast-Midwest Institute (NEMWI) has released a new report, “Deploying Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund Capital: A Challenge in Fiscal Federalism,” a study focusing on the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) program as it starts its life in a vastly changed federal energy policy and public capital investment policy environment. The report is authored by Institute Policy Research Intern Charlotte Sadelain, Dartmouth College, ’26, and edited by Institute Senior Fellow for Public Finance Policy Thomas H. Cochran.

Beginning in 1977, the Northeast-Midwest Institute has researched ways in which the federal government can and does assist states' public and private sectors to reduce both the costs and the negative environmental impacts of their energy sources and uses. In 1982, NEMWI published its “Users Guide to Government Energy Programs” that helped constituents and private sector partners understand how to access and most effectively use the 55 distinct financial and/or technical assistance energy programs offered by 18 federal agencies in 1982. 

The newly released NEMWI report highlights the threat to clean energy financing posed by Congressional advocates of deep appropriations reductions in the GGRF and the importance of local-, state-, and regional-level stakeholders around the country quickly coordinating and collaborating in new ways to identify pipelines of execution-ready projects to effectively capitalize on this opportunity to accelerate the clean energy transition. 

Some of the programs funded by The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) passed as a budget reconciliation bill can accommodate the needs of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) which are needed to carry out a wide range of important manufacturing, installation, and maintenance functions in the U.S. clean energy transition. The Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will provide through competitive award processes a total of $27 billion to several state and non-profit entities to invest in new clean energy technology, generation, and supply chain projects across the United States, largely through the financing of public and private SME-sponsored projects. 

The GGRF will support clean energy transition projects even in states governed by those who do not support energy transition goals by making non-profits, municipalities, and other entities that are capable of effectively and responsibly partnering with project developers as ultimate eligible end-use recipients. Delivering an equitable and coordinated approach to deploying this capital through the complex U.S. system of fiscal federalism will require excellent execution and oversight from an agency with no prior track-record in clean energy finance which must surmount the challenges of expert personnel shortages and political efforts to curtail the program. 

Read the full report, “Deploying Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund Capital: A Challenge in Fiscal Federalism,” here.

Connect With the Northeast-Midwest Institute

on LinkedIn

CONNECT with us on LinkedIn! The Northeast-Midwest Institute is re-vamping our LinkedIn page with new updates and information on our regional research and policy education programs. On LinkedIn we’ll be sharing timely updates on upcoming briefings, hearings, and events. NEMWI will also share important Great Lakes, water conservation, and manufacturing policy developments on LinkedIn to keep you in the know. 

Please consider joining us as we continue to foster connections both within and outside our organization. We hope that our new LinkedIn page will serve as a hub of collaboration among our partners and supporters. Our use of the site constitutes an exciting new opportunity to network and forge new relationships with organizations closely aligned with NEMWI and will provide a forum for discussion among a large network of stakeholders.