Require utilities to get a minimum share of power from renewable energy
Energy and environment
Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes. Others must also act.
Why shareholder democracy is necessary
Utilities decide their own generation mix and can raise renewable shares without a mandate, but binding statewide floors require legislation and cover companies beyond any one shareholder's reach. Corporate advocacy cuts both ways. InfluenceMap's December 2024 briefing found that in the run-up to the Inflation Reduction Act's passage, two thirds of the recorded corporate advocacy on its climate and energy provisions was supportive. State-level utility advocacy for natural gas infrastructure often opposes aggressive decarbonization. Investor engagement with utilities speeds the transition the standards would lock in. As You Sow's shareholder resolutions at Arizona utility APS preceded the company's 2020 commitment to 100 percent clean, carbon-free electricity by 2050, including 45 percent renewables by 2030. Deployment also faces a barrier no shareholder vote can lift: by the end of 2024 at least 450 counties across 44 states had adopted severe local siting restrictions on wind and solar, blocking projects that willing utilities could otherwise build.
How this was scoredNecessary
Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes. Others must also act.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
- Common Ground of the American People: Energy & the Environment, Program for Public Consultation / Voice of the People, 2026 (studies July 2024, June 2016)
- US Corporate Climate Advocacy Going Into 2025, InfluenceMap, 2024-12
- APS Changes Course for 100% Clean Energy Future, As You Sow, 2020-01-22
- Local Siting Laws Are Restricting Renewable Energy Projects Across the U.S., World Resources Institute, 2026-03-27
What civil society organizations are helping owners on this
Filed and withdrew resolutions at APS in 2017 and 2019 seeking less reliance on fossil fuels ahead of the utility's 2020 pledge of 45 percent renewables by 2030 and 100 percent clean power by 2050.
APS Changes Course for 100% Clean Energy Future, As You Sow, 2020-01
Recommends 2026 votes against directors at utilities relying disproportionately on coal and gas rather than renewables to serve data center demand.
1 campaign on record
Reduce the company's reliance on fossil fuel generation and address greenhouse gas emissions.
Result: Withdrawn after agreements with the company in both 2017 and 2019
In January 2020 APS committed to 45 percent renewable energy by 2030, a 65 percent clean mix by 2030 and 100 percent clean, carbon-free electricity by 2050.
APS Changes Course for 100% Clean Energy Future, As You Sow, 2020-01
Related subjects on other maps
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is Common Ground of the American People's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.