Summer 2023

In this exclusive interview with VX News, Marty Adams, the General Manager & Chief Engineer of the Los Angeles Department of Water & Power, with his retirement on the horizon, reflects on his decades-long career in the public agency, including his efforts to pioneer the national hydrogen energy revolution, as well as developing new strategies for water recycling and stormwater capture.

Just a day after announcing that the state of California is suing five of the biggest oil companies in the world for damages caused, and to be caused, for their ‘decades-long campaign of deception’ surrounding climate change, Governor Gavin Newsom also announced, via an interview with the New York Times at Climate Week NYC, his intention to sign two recently passed California climate bills, SB253 and 261. These two bills will require major companies to publicly disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, a move with national and global repercussions. The Governor also spoke at length on California’s continued commitment to a green low carbon future, as well as his view that California is where the future happens first.

VerdeXchange News recently interviewed Jon Rawding, the CEO of Euro Mechanical - an Emirati company that for more than four decades has supported the growth of Abu Dhabi’s energy sector - to better understand the continuing evolution of UAE’s energy goals and investments. Rawding confirms not only continued investment by UAE in oil and gas growth, but also their conscious evolution to investment in renewables. Rawding explains the aforementioned is all taking place in the UAE through ADNOC, the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, as the result of the sovereign’s leadership commitment to generational pragmatism in a time of worldwide climate existentialism.

As the process to begin pulling together the City of LA’s yearly budget moves forward this fall, LA’s City Council is also beginning efforts to seriously explore a Capital Infrastructure Plan (CIP), a document that provides a long-term, unified direction for investment in a city’s infrastructure. VerdeXchange News spoke with Investing in Place’ Executive Director, Jessica Meaney, on how the city’s budgeting could better address the needs of the city, improve equity and be more transparent. Meaney opines that the current way of doing things is failing to serve residents and why her organization’s work to push for a Capital Infrastructure Plan for the City of Los Angeles has been so important.

While the Port of Los Angeles’s Executive Director was in Asia and Australia this week to meet with various groups to promote trade in LA, Director Gene Seroka was interviewed by Bloomberg Asia’s Heslinda Amin and David Ingles to discuss where the Port stands at the midpoint of the year and just before its peak season. Based on the high inventory levels and the movement of some cargo to other ports around the country, Seroka anticipates a lower than usual peak season.

In this exclusive interview with VX News, former CA Senate Majority Leader and former Speaker of the State Assembly, Bob Hertzberg lays out five pieces of advice that he has learned throughout his impressive political career for a future generation of decision-makers, based on some of the mos