The U.S. presidential campaigns both have their eyes on the critical swing state of Pennsylvania — and Pennsylvania, as ever, has its eyes on energy. The state is the nation’s second-largest producer and exporter of fuels for energy — mostly natural gas and coal. The future of those industries is sufficiently important to the state’s voters that one of Vice President Kamala Harris’ first political decisions as a presidential candidate this summer was to drop her support for a ban on fracking.
But even with continued fracking in the western part of the state, the state’s fossil fuel industry jobs are poised to dry up, and they have been showing signs of doing so for years. The future for the state’s energy industry is beginning to look much different than its past: Polling shows that Pennsylvanians broadly support an expansion of clean energy. That support is not just limited to climate-conscious Democrats in the state’s urban areas — it’s also beginning to show up in the industrial professions that have long depended on Pennsylvania’s legacy fossil fuel industry. In the latest sign of this shift, last wee... Read more
