Our Focus

No matter where you live – you experienced climate change firsthand. Unprecedented floods, brutal heat waves, searing wildfires, and intense hurricanes have become the norm instead of the exception.

This moment calls for visionary thinking and action that brings everyone forward. That’s why, in early 2024, we introduced the updated focus areas – a coordinated effort to focus on six important areas to align utilities, industry, regulators, legislators, customers, and other energy stakeholders toward a carbon-free energy future. We believe that by solving the challenges around these six areas, we can drive industry progress toward our shared climate goals.

Beginning in January 2024, SEPA will roll out education, research, workshops and events to bring all stakeholders together and determine where our collective efforts will have the greatest impact.

These next few years are crucial. Half of the carbon in our atmosphere was emitted in the last 30 years – what will the next 10 years look like? By the end of 2025, we must have a much better picture of what the energy system of 2030, 2040, and 2050 will look like. Decisions and investments in our energy future made over the next two years will determine the speed and success of our carbon-free transition over the next two decades.

Energy use is the number one contributor to climate change – there is no escaping its prevalence in our lives and society. We must accelerate the industry’s progress towards a carbon-free energy system. We don’t have time for incremental change, we need big, bold ideas.

This amazing opportunity comes with the great responsibility of ensuring all of our friends, neighbors, colleagues, constituents, and customers can take part in an equitable carbon-free transformation regardless of race, ethnicity, geography, and socioeconomic status. We must be deliberate in prioritizing communities that have historically been overlooked or overburdened as we transition to clean energy. It will take all of us, working together, to succeed.

Meet some of the focus area leaders