Provides a tax abatement for facilty-integrated carbon-to-value equipment

• Democratic5

◆ The sponsor's argument

Why Robert Jackson says this is needed

In recent years, New York State and New York City have made bold statu- tory commitments to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions over the next three decades. Direct emissions reductions in key economic sector through efficiency, and transitioning to zero and low carbon energy sources and technologies will account for the majority of progress made towards these ambitious, legally mandated targets. In the dense urban context of New York City, buildings account for 751 of greenhouse gas emissions. As a consequence, local climate protection laws focus signif- icantly on strategies to reduce emissions at the building scale. In addition to energy efficiency, electrification, renewable energy substitution and climate effective design and planning, the rapidly emerging carbontech (or carbonto-value) sector represents a promising new means of ensuring that New York State and New York City emission goals are successfully met. Carbontech refers to a spectrum of technolo- gies that remove CO2 from the air, capture it at point sources, and/or sequester it in goods or in the geosphere. This evolving industry is now delivering a growing number of solutions that can reduce emissions at the building scale within cities like New York. For those industrial and commercial segments of the local building stock that will prove most difficult to fully reduce the emissions of in compliance with mandated targets, carbontech solutions are creating additional compliance options for building owners, and supplemental pathways for overall emissions reduction success. Avoiding punitive fines for noncompliance is now more acute than ever in COVID-19 era New York, where large property owners now face extreme economic uncertainty and pressure as remote work and industrial realignments represent exis- tential threats. Carbontech can offer another pathway for compliance for such buildings. The property tax abatement proposed with this legislation will stimulate demand for building-integrated carbontech applications, increasing the financial performance of such investments and adoption by building owners. This legislation builds on the success precedents established by earlier legislation that introduced property tax abatements in New York City for solar electric technology, battery storage systems, and green roofs. This legislation will advance New York's strategic efforts to attract carbontech businesses to New York State and New York City. Recent investments by the State in carbontech research and development and commercialization, combined with the State's world class advanced tech- nology industries and infrastructure, and the market drivers created by both the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act and the New York City Climate Mobilization Act, New York City is well positioned to become a global economic hub for this future one trillion dollar indus- try. Establishing a demand-side incentive in the form of a property tax abatement will make New York City the strongest market for building- integrated carbontech solutions in the world, and consequently will attract new businesses and jobs to the City.

This is the sponsor's own case for the bill, quoted from their memorandum. It is not Agora's description of what the bill does.