Texas’ strong winds and abundant sunshine make it ideal for clean energy.

Texas’ strong winds and abundant sunshine make us an ideal leader for clean energy.

A new Rice University study points out that Texas’ environment — which produces sufficient wind and solar power — is ideal to greatly reduce the state’s reliance on fossil fuels. The report should open politicians’ eyes to the potential for a Green New Deal to boost the nation’s economy by creating alternative energy jobs.

The Rice study said with better integration of the state’s wind and solar resources Texas would no longer need coal, which currently produces about 25 percent of the state’s electricity. Natural gas generates 45 percent. “Wind and solar are easily capable of picking up the slack,” said Dan Cohan, co-author of the study.

Only 18 percent of electricity in Texas is generated by wind, while solar energy accounts for less than 1 percent of the state’s generating capacity. Those numbers are expected to go up as energy companies continue efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change and make it more likely we’ll have to endure disastrous events like Hurricane Harvey.

A Green New Deal could expedite more solar and wind power usage, but first people need to know what a Green New Deal means. One of the idea’s best known proponents is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the new Democratic representative from New York. Her unabashed support for leftist reforms has stoked fear among conservatives who see her as a socialist Joan of Arc.

Ocasio-Cortez has proposed a resolution to create a bipartisan committee that would draft legislation calling for the country to be “fully powered by renewable energy sources” within 10 years after the committee becomes active. A bipartisan committee would allow Texans to have their representatives on the panel to make sure this state’s perspective is heard on any public policy proposals.

The congresswoman said she doesn’t want committee members who have taken campaign donations from the oil and gas industry. She’s fearful of legislation being watered down. The Affordable Care Act was weakened by the medical insurance industry when it was being crafted. It would make sense, however, to include the oil and gas industry in any discussion that might change how it provides the nation’s energy.

No state will be more impacted by a Green New Deal than Texas — no city more so than Houston. Our representatives need to ensure we have a seat at the table when Congress starts crafting our nation’s inevitable response to climate change. A stubborn refusal to welcome forward-thinking politicians from oil and gas country, or a futile insistence by those representatives to stand athwart history, will set our region down the rust-hued path of other blue-collar industries that refused to keep up with the times. Nobody should want Texas to reach the nadirs of today’s coal country. Nobody should want Houston to follow in the footsteps of 20th century Detroit or Pittsburgh. That’s a fact even Ocasio-Cortez and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz should be able to agree upon.

Whether Ocasio-Cortez can get traction with her Green New Deal proposal is questionable. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi supported creation of a new Select Committee on the Climate Crisis whose directive isn’t as ambitious as a Green New Deal.

Call it what you want, America needs a feasible plan that combats global warming by accelerating our replacement of fossil fuels with alternative energy sources, begins erection of a smart grid, sparks construction of new energyefficient homes and creates millions of jobs to replace those lost in the coal, oil and gas sectors.

Some state will lead the next energy revolution — why not Texas?

That’s an opportunity Texans can and should support. They just need the politicians in Washington to climb out of the ditch they dug with partisan shovels and do something good for all Americans.