The Californer - Ahead of Climate Week NYC, Governor Newsom announces California cut climate pollution again as economy keeps growing

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Sep 21, 2026

Ahead of Climate Week NYC, Governor Newsom announces California cut climate pollution again as economy keeps growing

The Golden State keeps leading on climate as DC Republicans vote to put polluters over America's economic security

What you need to know: California reduced statewide greenhouse gas emissions by 3.9% according to new data, while the state's economy grew 3.2% the same year, extending a two-decade record of cutting climate pollution while building one of the world's largest economies. Overall emissions are 28% below their 2004 peak even as California's economy has nearly doubled.

SACRAMENTO – Ahead of Climate Week NYC, Governor Gavin Newsom today announced that California continued to cut climate pollution, reducing statewide greenhouse gas emissions by 3.9% while growing the economy in 2024 — according to new data released today.

New data released today by the California Air Resources Board (CARB) shows statewide greenhouse gas emissions are now 28% below their 2004 peak, continuing its long-term decline in greenhouse gas emissions while the Golden State's economy continues to expand. The 2024 annual reduction is equivalent to removing more than 3.2 million gasoline-powered cars from California's roads for one year. The reductions came as California's gross state product increased by 3.2%.

Donald Trump is giving the fossil fuel industry exactly what it wants, rolling back climate-pollution limits for coal and gas power plants and putting American workers and businesses at a disadvantage in the global race for the industries and jobs of the future. California refuses to choose between building a strong economy and cutting pollution to protect healthy communities. We will keep building the clean energy economy of the future and proving that one of the world's largest economies can tackle climate change.

Governor Gavin Newsom

"California is once again proving that economic growth and environmental protection go hand in hand," said CARB Chair Lauren Sanchez. "Twenty years ago, we bet that tackling climate change would make California stronger. The results speak for themselves — emissions falling, our economy growing, and our air getting cleaner."

California is delivering results

The statewide inventory, California's annual accounting of climate pollution from transportation, electricity, industry, homes, businesses, and other sources, reflects continued emissions reductions across California's economy:

Transportation achieved the largest total decrease driven by the rising use of renewable diesel and zero-emission vehicles.
Even as there was an increase in total electricity generation, power sector emissions were down due to the continued expansion of renewables and batteries.
Industrial, agricultural, and commercial and residential emissions also fell.

Two decades of climate leadership

Signed into law 20 years ago, AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, established California's climate leadership and the state's first greenhouse gas reduction goal — get back to 1990 levels by 2020. The target was met six years early in 2014.

AB 32 spurred the development of California's groundbreaking climate policies, including the Cap-and-Invest Program, the Low Carbon Fuel Standard, clean car programs, and more. California has built on that foundation with increasingly ambitious climate goals:

2016: Governor Brown signed SB 32 requiring the state to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by December 31, 2030
2022: Governor Newsom signed AB 1279, codifying the goal to achieve statewide net carbon neutrality by 2045 and establishing an 85% emissions reduction target as part of that goal.

California by the numbers

Today, California's success has become a blueprint for governments around the world, and every Californian can take pride in the state's accomplishments:

28% drop in emissions since 2004
2.7 million zero-emission vehicles sold
216,445 public and shared EV chargers
67% clean energy
21,860 MW of battery storage
70% renewable diesel
$36 billion raised by Cap-and-Invest auctions for California Climate Investments statewide
#1 in the nation for clean energy jobs with 552,300 employed

Why it matters

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The science behind climate change is irrefutable. California has tracked its impacts for more than two decades, finding rapidly accelerating effects on the state. With the increasing severity and frequency of drought, flooding, wildfire, extreme heat, and other impacts, Californians only have to look out their windows to know that climate change is real and rapidly worsening.

The impacts once thought decades away are happening now. The Indicators of Climate Change in California Report and other recent research detail some of the impacts:

During an 11-year period, exposure to climate-driven wildfire smoke caused more than 50,000 deaths in California and more than $400 billion in economic impacts.
During seven extreme heat events over the past decade, California experienced $7.7 billion in losses.
Fueled by record drought conditions linked to climate change, the January 2025 Southern California wildfires caused widespread loss of life and property. The economic impacts from these fires alone is estimated to be more than $30 billion.
The average American born in 2024 is expected to face $500,000 in additional costs due to climate change in their lifetime; those who experience more severe climate impacts can expect to face a toll of up to $1 million.

California's plan to achieve carbon neutrality will help curb these impacts and deliver significant benefits:

Reduce air pollution 71%
Reduce greenhouse gas emissions 85%
Reduce petroleum demand 94%
Create 4 million new jobs
Save Californians $200 billion in avoided health costs

California's clean energy leadership

Since Governor Newsom took office in 2019, California has added more than 37,000 megawatts of utility-scale clean and renewable energy to serve the California grid — and battery storage has ramped up from fewer than 700 MW to more than 21,000 MW, helping make the grid more reliable and pushing the state further along its clean energy transition.

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Batteries play a key role in California's goal of getting all of its electricity from clean sources by 2045. The most recent numbers, from the end of 2024, show real progress: 67% of retail electricity sales in the state already come from clean energy. Last year, clean energy met 100% of the state's electricity needs for at least part of the day on 279 separate days. So far in 2026, that's happened on more than nine out of 10 days during the first half of the year.

California is building this fleet safely. In 2024, Governor Newsom launched a State Battery Storage Safety Collaborative that has already delivered updated fire codes, new state oversight of battery facilities, and stronger safety standards statewide. The CPUC helps maintain electric grid reliability for the public by ensuring power plants and energy storage systems comply with CPUC standards for operations and maintenance.

Clean energy is also good for the economy. California leads the nation in total clean energy jobs, with 552,300 workers employed across clean energy technologies, nearly twice as many as the second-ranked state, Texas, according to a 2025 report from E2. California's clean energy workforce grew by nearly 7,300 workers in 2024, outpacing job growth in the rest of the state's economy by more than three times.

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