Major Project Labor Agreement Executed with New York State Building and Construction Trades to Ensure Line is Constructed by Union Workers

Infrastructure Development Expected to Bring $3.5 Billion in Economic Benefits to New Yorkers and Create Nearly 1,400 Family-Sustaining Jobs

Accelerates Progress to Achieve New York's Goal of 70 Percent of Electricity Statewide from Renewable Sources by 2030 on Path to a Zero-Emission Grid

Governor Hochul: "I want the rest of the nation to see what we're doing right here and say, 'Well that seemed pretty bold, seemed pretty audacious, a little bit out there. But they did it. But they did it.' And that is in our legacy, our DNA in fact is New York because we always strive for great things and yet we always achieve them. And so, this Champlain Hudson line is an example, how we confront climate change challenges and energy challenges together, in the meantime, creatinggreat jobs for a cleaner, healthier New York."

Hochul: "This is what makes me so proud to be Governor of this state, people in the room like this because when you leave here today, you'll know in your heart that you're part of something magnific: A transformation that has been talked about, dreamed about, thought about for years, and it happened right here today in Whitehall."

Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul celebrated the start of construction of the 339-mile Champlain Hudson Power Express transmission line, being developed by Transmission Developers Inc, to deliver reliable clean energy from Hydro-Québec in Canada directly to New York City. The construction of this green infrastructure project, which begins following the execution of a major union labor agreement between the developer and New York State Building and Construction Trades, is expected to bring $3.5 billion in economic benefits to New Yorkers while creating nearly 1,400 family-sustaining union jobs during construction. Today's announcement accelerates progress to achieve New York's Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act goal to obtain 70 percent of electricity statewide from renewable sources by 2030 on the path to a zero-emission grid.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks are available below:

Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Thank you for the warm welcome. It is great to be here. First, I want to welcome all of you to this magnificent space. This building goes back to 1899. It's the Whitehall Castle. It sounds very grand, and I'm grateful that we have a chance to be able to gather here.

I want to acknowledge the owners who brought us here today. Are they in the audience here? I want to make sure you recognize these are two - please stand up because these are two transplants, Roark Merrill and his wife, Liz Carnes, two transplants from Southern California. So, I said, "Have you been through a New York winter yet?" And they said, "No." Okay. I mentioned that I happened to be in Buffalo about 10 days ago, and we broke a statewide historic record of 82 inches of snow in 24 hours or so, something like that. But I said, "I think you're pretty okay here. You don't worry. It's going to be fine." But thank you for hosting us and everybody book your events here. This is a beautiful place. It's got a history and I want to make sure we support our local entrepreneurs who are making things happen, so great to be here as well.

I also had a chance to speak to someone yesterday who's very disappointed she could not be here. Energy Secretary, Jennifer Granholm. She called me up and she said, "You're not going to believe this, but I was out running and I broke my ankle," and she says, "I was going to try to get on the plane anyhow, but they just fitted the cast and the doctor said it wasn't a good idea." So, she will come back up here. She's very excited about this, but I know that she's been up - we've done a number of energy announcements here in the State of New York, and the Biden administration is truly committed to what we are doing here today. And I want to make sure they are recognized.

You heard from Doreen Harris. When we think back, you know, people beyond our time on Earth, when we look back at how New York State was transformed in a way that is just the envy of the rest of the nation, Doreen Harris will be the one associated with this. And I want to thank her as a CEO of NYSERDA and others, and Richard Kauffman and everyone who's involved in this process, this whole vision. First you have to have the vision, but then you have to have the ability to execute, as you said. I don't want to just sit around and be a dreamer. We're going to be doers here, and that's exactly what Doreen Harris does. Let's give her another round of applause.

We have great elected leaders here as well. I will give a special shout-out to all the mayors and supervisors. I spent 14 years as a local government official in the trenches. I know what it's like and you know you're working on your budget until 1:00 AM and the grocery store happens to be open, you go there and you got constituents who are telling you the way it should be done. So, I know how hard you work and it's often thankless, so to our local officials, but to my partners in state government. We have Senator Dan Stechere. Thank you for continuing to be helping us lead projects like this. Assemblymember Matt Simpson is here. Thank you. Assemblymember Billy Jones is here. Worked with Billy for a long time. Where's Billy? There's Billy in the second row there. Along with Carrie Woerner, thank you for being here. Betty Little is here. Our dear friend, a former senator. We did a lot of projects together. It is great to see you again.

Also, we are so honored to have the Grand Chief, Sky-Deer, of the Mohawk Council of the Kahnawake. Did I say that properly? Got it, got it. I'm going to get it right. So, we're honored to have you here. Your presence reminds us of our responsibility, not to the next generation, but to seven generations. And that is the philosophy we embrace here today as we lean into our energy future.

And to all of my outstanding commissioners who are here today - Roberta Reardon has joined us, Department of Labor. I see Marie Therese Dominguez here from the Department of Transportation is here. I see Basil Seggos is here, I want to thank him. Commissioner Moy, who runs everything that we touch, all of our operations. Commissioner Moy, I want to thank you as well. So, we have the dream team in place. We have our plans, we have goals, and I just want to thank also our friends in Labor who make everything happen here as well. We have Michael Lyons here representing all kinds of people. But also Gary LaBarbera, who could not be here today, the Head of the New York State Building Trades. We are very proud to have them as well.

As well as our friends from Québec. I'm so grateful and I know a number couldn't make it. I think one of our ministers couldn't make it down because of plane problems, something I'm familiar with. That's all right. But Martine Hébert, our Québec Delegate General, we just were gathered in New York City recently, and I want to thank you for your great representation of a place that we cherish as well. We also have Pierre Despars, the Vice President of Hydro-Québec, and you'll hear about my relationship with this group going way back to 2015. And Donald Jessome, the President and CEO of the TDI, Transmission Developers Incorporated, the people who made this come to reality. So, I'm grateful. Is there anybody here I didn't mention? You're all very special. And you'll look back at this day. You'll say you were here in a room when we really launched into a whole new future. One that says there are no bounds, that we can dream big but we're also going to do extraordinary things.

And this project was actually brought to my attention one month after I became Lieutenant Governor, back in 2015. So, I've been talking about this. I had a chance to meet with the leadership of the Québec government in Québec City. I went up there we talked about this. It was bold, it was audacious, and people say, "Can we make this happen?" I also had a chance to have meetings in my office in New York City as well. So, this has been talked about for probably at least a decade, if I'm not mistaken. A long time coming. Now we need to make up for some lost time. So, they proposed a very bold, audacious project to help power New York City with hydroelectric power from Québec. You just think about that, it is like sitting around, maybe having a glass of wine, thinking like how can we power New York City? Why not power from Québec? Why not generate that power there to supplement what we're doing elsewhere in the state? So, we saw the great potential of this idea and literally one year ago today, everything changed, it was November 2020 when we finalized the contract for two transformative projects, clean energy projects, combined together. The most broad in scale in our state's history. And we began charting a whole new course for our state which is exactly what I wanted to do, making these historic investments in how we power our communities and create opportunities for those good-paying jobs which really excites me. I love the jobs we're creating.

So, here we're talking about protecting our environment, delivering a whole new way of powering New York City. And you say, "Why are we doing that? You know why aren't we discontinuing with the way we've always done it?" Because often the status quo is the easiest path. Well, I have a commitment to our environment that goes way back to growing up in what we look back on now and we didn't know it then, was pretty much a toxic disaster. I grew up in a place called Buffalo, New York. Not far down the road was Love Canal. You all know the Love Canal story. We lived through that experience. We also - I lived in a community. My parents lived in a trailer park there right near the steel plant where every night you'd look out and you'd see this lava looking substance being deposited, dropped into Lake Erie where we swam as children by day. And by day, I always thought the skies were supposed to be orange because we saw the billowing smoke every day, and all you saw when you drove through. You sometimes couldn't even see, you'd have to put on your windshield wipers hoping you could get through the smoke from the pollution generated by the smoke sacks. That's where I grew up. That's where I grew up. That was the world that existed for so many, and my dad and grandpa worked at that steel plant. Everybody said, "It's about the jobs. It's about the jobs." No one questioned this. But that's probably why I'm such an environmentalist today. Because I know the effect it has on people's health in a community overall.

And we said, "No more, no more. We can't sustain this." And changes were made back then, thank God people had the vision. The vision that we're talking about today, when people recognize in the future what we're doing today, the same way I'm recognizing, actually, Richard Nixon and others, who had the foresight to say we can no longer treat our lakes and our waterways like dumping grounds and no longer be callous about how we treat our beautiful air. So, that's why I always say, I'm an environmental justice champion to my core. How could you not be when you saw what these polluters have done for such a long time?

But to make sure that no other children grow up in that kind of environment, we have to take the bold steps today the right the wrongs of the past, and make sure that they never occur again. Because if you live in a community with dirty water, dirty air, you develop asthma or heart disease as a result of your environment. And I still think there's a lot of people in Buffalo who have long-term effects from this. Literally, I think about it now, we used to have - being Catholic, we grew up having fish fries on Friday during Lent, but those fish came out of Lake Erie. It's amazing we're still alive. I digress, but so you grow up in these environments you realize you know and if your home now today is vulnerable to extreme weather. Hurricanes, we observed the 10th anniversary, it's not a positive one, but the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Sandy that slammed Long Island, hit the Mid-Hudson, the flooding that went on all the way up to the North Country with other tropical storms. And then as Governor for little a matter of days, I got slammed with not our first, but our second hurricane just last year. So, the extreme weather, not just people's health, but the extreme weather events that are the result of climate change and mankind's assault, sorry to the men, but it does say mankind's assault on mother nature, and that is what has been happening a long time, and a lot of communities had to bare disproportionate impacts.

And this is what we also say was environmental injustice because no one - there were no champions for people, particularly in Black and Brown communities that were the ones who were forced to accept this. So, as I've said before, we're really the first generation to feel the effects of climate change, but we're the last ones that can do anything about it. You speak about the seven generations - I act with a sense of urgency just even for the next generation. How are we going to leave this place better for them? And I'm proud to say here in New York State, we understand this. And when it comes to the fight against climate change, we've committed to nation-leading practices in every single way.

And you heard it from Doreen, 70 percent of our electricity will come from renewables by 2030 - 70 percent. And we used to talk about 2030 as if it is off into the future. That's right around the corner. I'm still going to be alive then, so we're not talking about goals of 2070 or 2090. It's not, it's right around the corner. 85 percent emission reductions by 2050. These are ambitious, but they're doable. They're doable. When you take the steps like we're doing here today to start charting a different path, and that's exactly what this infrastructure we're talking about here today is all about. It's part of this larger puzzle. And in fact, you think about Upstate, you know where I lived up until last year in Downtown Buffalo. On the site of that Bethlehem Steel Plant that I was describing to you in rather graphic terms of what it was like, on that very site, are wind turbines. Look at that beautiful transition on that same site. Wind turbines, right there. Offshore wind.

We invested over $500 million to create the supply chain to develop offshore wind off the shores of Long Island. That is bold and audacious. And so, we've benefited outside of New York City from Clean Energy Initiatives. You see turbines, you see solar arrays all over the place, but New York City has been behind. They've not been able to take advantage of this. And they are still the part of our state with the largest population that is the most heavily reliant on fossil fuels. And you think about the upstate downstate divide, people talk about it, I don't believe it, but today's announcement demonstrates that there is a symbiotic relationship between upstate and downstate.

And here we are at a place town of Whitehall, population 2,485. It's cute. It's a nice community. It's a great community, and it punches above its weight. It has great attractions, but they'll bring power - what we're doing here today in this tiny community and many others like it - to a city of 8 million. That is the connection. That is the connection that I see and I embrace because I want people to feel that their destiny is interconnected with people in other parts of the state. That's how we get to this dream of really believing we are one New York. Projects like these are an important step toward that.

So, what's also important is it's not just energy generated in our state, it's coming from Québec. Our neighbor to the North. That is the connection I'm talking about. We are not living on an island unto ourselves here in New York State. We'll reach out beyond our boundaries and find ways to create jobs and opportunities, protect our environment, and deliver power to a city that desperately needs it. So, that's why we're doing this. And these high voltage cables that you usually see on power - I don't live far from the Niagara Falls Power Plant. Everywhere you look up along the freeway, you see the transmission lines. They're not the prettiest lines you'd ever want to see. We're not going to do that here. We're not going to do this to this beautiful part of our state. We're going to bury them underground. You will not see them. And that is also something we should not take for granted. I guarantee it's easier to put them up, but this is how we're going to do it because we cherish the communities that they'll be going through. This is what I come from as a local official who had to make a lot of tough decisions about what my community's going to look like when people want to put cell towers everywhere and all these other - you have to protect the integrity of your community.

This project will allow you to do that. This is why it's so important. So, this is our opportunity. It's going to make a huge difference in people's lives, the air we breathe, our children's health, as well as creating these great jobs. And so this transition, you know, working in partnership with the Department of Public Service, Doreen Harris, and everybody advanced Tier Four. It's the first-of-its-kind program to make sure that this energy really does get there. And this, as we call it, the Champlain Power Express - my team calls it, "Chippy," because it's short - I don't know if you like that or not. We'll call it the Champlain Hudson Path. That plus another initiative we agreed to at the same time, you know, people were saying, you have this or you do a project with wind and solar in the Catskills region. And we're like, I think we can do both at the same time.

I've always been a firm believer you can walk and chew gum at the same time. We can multitask. Women are really good at multitasking - no offense to the men. Let's do them both at the same time. So we're also launching this at the same time we're launching Clean Path New York. This is how you make not an incremental difference, but a profound difference. And when we are done with these two projects, we'll have enough clean energy to meet one-third of New York City's electric demands. That's extraordinary. One decision, two projects, wrap it up just in a matter of a very short time, and all of a sudden, we're making a difference. And I'm proud of our partnership with our friends in Québec and the energy leaders, the energy leaders from TDI, and other organizations who bring these visions to us. And so I thank them to help really make this transition so meaningful.

So today, the next milestone in our big efforts, we are announcing the construction of a 339-mile Champlain Hudson Power Express line. It'll bring the clean hydropower from Hydro-Québec, Canada directly to New York City, and once complete in 2026, it'll deliver 1,250 megawatts. What does that mean? Let me put it in a words you'll understand. One million. One million homes will be powered because of what we're doing here. That's extraordinary. And - you can give that a round of applause - and over the first 10 years of the project, we'll reduce carbon emissions by 37 million metric tons. And that's the equivalent of taking half a million cars off the roads of New York. And that alone, this project alone represents seven percent of our statewide clean energy goals for 2031, project hits seven percent right there. Unbelievable.

So, the construction begins right here in Whitehall. Congratulations, Whitehall, you're going to be on the map. It's like talking about where the Erie Canal started. They'll be talking about where this started years from now. And the initial phase is a 17.6 stretch of transmission through Washington County. This is the largest stretch of the line, and it'll put us on our, as I mentioned, it's going to make us help achieve our goals, but there's also an economic benefit. It's estimated to be $3.5 billion in economic benefits to New Yorkers. $1.4 billion in increased tax revenue to 73 municipalities and 59 school districts. Let me repeat that. $1.4 billion localities in school districts, and I know you're going to spend it well, as well as a $40 million Green Economy Fund to ensure the surrounding community benefits are there for the communities, and it'll create over 1,400 quality family-sustaining prevailing wage jobs, let me repeat that, prevailing wage jobs during construction, and that is very, very good news for the people who live here and those who will come here in search of those jobs to continue.

And maybe next time we get together, the population of Whitehall will not be 2,485. It's going to continue to increase because people will see the quality of life we have here, extraordinary places. And also, the jobs will be here, and that is what this is all about. So, we're very proud of the labor. I'm proud of the work - a lot of projects don't always work out, where you have this partnership with labor, they have to work together. So, Champlain, Hudson, and its contractors, I commend you for working so closely on union agreements with the New York State Building Trades, and it includes skilled tradespeople from over 15 unions across 22 different disciplines, but also the contractors went beyond.

They also pledged to employ MWBEs and service-disabled veteran-owned businesses whenever possible, which is important to me personally, and making sure that disadvantaged communities have participation throughout the project. So, all New Yorkers from up here all the way to the city can benefit from this and make sure that we are meeting their needs as well. That's how we get people into the good paying jobs. We get the training done, you open the door, the jobs are here and allow people to lift their families up. And I'll just make an observation. This report came out yesterday, the day before, about the breathtaking number of jobs that are being created in the green energy space. We've talked about this for a long time. People realize, are we really going to hit those numbers? Is this realistic? New York's green jobs grew almost 5 percent from 2020 through 2021, almost five percent. And that doesn't even include products like we're announcing here today. That's over 7,000 jobs in 12 months.

I'll take that any day of the week, having lived in an area where one steel plant shut down, it was 20,000 jobs out the door, and that took a big hit on the community I came from. I'll never forget that. So, look at 7,000 new jobs created just over, and it's one of the fastest recoveries of any industry after Covid. Others are still languishing. Some are still hit. And this is where we started propelling New York State into this post-pandemic world by creating these thousands of good jobs. And also, just we're also continuing our path toward bold ideas. And I thank everyone in the room who voted for the $4.2 billion Clean Water, Clean Air, Green Jobs Environmental Bond Act. That Environmental Bond is going to set us on a path of the clean energy revolution. We also, and Basil's here, we have our largest investment in the Environmental Protection Fund. As I mentioned, our investments in offshore winds, so we'll put the money out there. We'll work with anybody. We'll work with Québec. We'll work with our neighboring states. We'll work with anybody who wants to work with us and to achieve these bold goals.

So, here in New York, you know, we don't follow trends. We start trends. And I want the rest of the nation to see what we're doing right here and say, "Well that seemed pretty bold, seemed pretty audacious, a little bit out there. But they did it. But they did it." And that is in our legacy, our DNA in fact is New York because we always strive for great things and yet we always achieve them. And so, this Champlain Hudson line is an example, how we confront climate change challenges and energy challenges together, in the meantime, creating great jobs for a cleaner, healthier New York. So, I want to thank everybody for participating here today.

This is what makes me so proud to be Governor of this state, people in the room like this because when you leave here today, you'll know in your heart that you're part of something magnific: A transformation that has been talked about, dreamed about, thought about for years, and it happened right here today in Whitehall.

Congratulations to everyone involved. Let's carry on and let you hear from other wonderful speakers and let me introduce - let me see who I'm supposed to introduce here. Oh, Don Jessome is here, the President and CEO of Transmission Developers. He's going to be speaking about their vision for this project. Well, and I want to congratulate Donald, and everybody involved from the company as well.