California has been dealing with its share of environmental and water issues in the past few weeks- the state Congress has been attempting to create a water management plan for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, the water system that provides water for 2 out of 3 Californians. In addition, the legislature passed an Eleventh-hour bill in regard to renewable energy in the state.

The legislative session officially ended on September 11, Friday of last week- and it ended without a management plan in place for the water system, leaving lawmakers and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger frustrated.

Reuters reports the news with an attention-grabbing headline: “California feud breaks out on clean energy plan.”

California feud? I think that broke out long ago. But point taken. Schwarzenegger has said that he will veto a bill requiring California to obtain electricity from solar, wind and other renewable sources. It’s not the concept he is against, though, it’s the rules that the bill has in place.

Schwarzenegger believes that the version of the bill passed just before the end of the legislative session will in fact make it more difficult to build solar plants in California.

"The industry and regulators are going to wind up spending the next few years wrangling about how to implement the bill as opposed to actually putting steel in the ground," said Nancy Ryan, Public Utilities Commission Deputy Director.

Because California is the largest market in the U.S. for renewable power, decisions here are important and precedent-setting. In fact, they have some kind of influence on the national Congress debate- whatever happens here could be a big part of how the national plan takes shape. California also has the standout perspective that green jobs are happening, that they are the future and that the question is how to do it, not whether to do it. Again, this positions California as a leader not only for those industries but in setting the tone for what the U.S. Congress is looking into.

Everyone agrees that California should get 33% of its electricity from solar, wind and other alternatives by the time 2020 rolls around. Even though he will be vetoing the legislature’s plan, Schwarzenegger will be issuing an executive order to the Air Resources Board to implement the 33% goal- the problem is that whoever winds in 2010 could just cancel that order- couple that with Schwarzenegger’s veto and you have a state that is supposed to be leading the renewable energy field with no plan (to go along with no water management plan) and a whole lot of arguments.

"If the governor does not sign the bill ... we fear that there will be uncertainty and chaos in this market for years," said California Wind Energy Association Executive Director, Nancy Rader.

And that’s the real danger here- not that California will do the wrong thing but that we will do nothing at all. Yes, there should be debate and discussion and even disagreement about how we should go about this- but to end with nothing happening at all is inexcusable. The renewable energy market is adaptable and will adapt to whatever the regulations and rules are- whatever is chosen will need to be revised- but let’s make sure there are rules, there is forward motion, and there is a commitment to making something happen.