Administrative presidents across the 5Cs announced Friday, April 17, that the colleges will transition to 100% renewable electricity by enrolling in the Clean Power Alliance (CPA), following a more than yearlong 5C Environmental Justice (5CEJ) campaign to phase out fossil fuels.
The “Claremont Off Fossil Fuels” campaign collected more than 1300 petition signatures since Oct. 2025 in support of a proposal for the colleges to stop purchasing electricity from Southern California Edison (SCE) — an investor-owned utility that primarily relies on fossil fuels — and instead enroll in the CPA, a not-for-profit energy provider that offers a 100% renewable electricity option. The Claremont Colleges’ Business and Financial Affairs Committee (BFAC) and the consortium-wide presidents’ committee have now approved the proposal.
Milo Slevin PO ’28, campaign co-founder, said the win was possible because of collective student-led efforts that put pressure on each college administration, which he said weren’t doing enough to invest in clean energy and environmental justice.
“It was this really challenging combination of needing, on the one hand, to educate ourselves on what this switch would mean, and to also build power and build student support,” Slevin said.
Under this agreement with CPA, the 5Cs will triple the percentage of renewable electricity used on campus. Through its renewable portfolio — solar, wind, geothermal and hydroelectric — the Clean Power Alliance supports significant greenhouse gas reduction efforts and is one of the largest providers of 100% renewable electricity in the United States.
Slevin pointed out how electricity constitutes the largest portion of Pomona’s total emissions, about 30%. After the expected six month transition to renewable energy, the College’s electricity emissions will be reduced to zero.
A consortium-wide change in energy provider is a significant step toward Pomona’s goal of carbon neutrality by 2030, President Garbrielle Starr underscored in an email to TSL.
“Sustainability is not an aspiration at Pomona College — it’s core to who we are as an institution,” Starr wrote. “For years, students, faculty, staff, and our Board have worked diligently toward ambitious climate goals, driven by a shared conviction that the choices we make today shape the future we aspire to build.”
Student advocacy was integral to expanding renewable energy use across the consortium, Laura Muna-Landa said in a press release to TSL.
“The effort has also benefited from thoughtful engagement by students and administrators, including the 5C Environmental Justice group,” Laura Muna-Landa, the assistant vice president for communications of the Claremont Colleges wrote.
5CEJ representatives mobilized students through events and direct engagement with administrators. Organizers announced and celebrated their successful long-term advocacy at the start of the April 17 Riding Rally, which began outside Harvey Mudd College’s Hoch-Shanahan Dining Commons and concluded on Marston Quad at Pomona.
Around 40 students, holding signs and wearing face paint, biked across the campuses. They stopped by the financial office of each college to deliver petition signatures and thank-you notes to those involved in the proposal’s approval. Lucy Reed SC ‘28 emphasized students’ roles in advocating for the colleges to adopt a renewable energy option.
“It wasn’t even a question on their agenda until we put it there,” Reed, a campaign working group leader, said. “We did that by talking to a lot of people and being very persistent and we had to show that this is something that students care about.”
The event reflected the campaign’s broader strategy of combining visible student mobilization and direct engagement with decision-makers.
“We wanted to go to every office that had a say in this and bring them the accumulation of a year’s worth of work — the signatures, the letters, the resolutions,” Reed said.
These combined efforts, according to Slevin, incrementally strengthened their case — resulting in administrative approval, which he described as an improved alignment of the colleges’ actions and stated goals.
“We were able to leverage all of our community support as the reason why [BFAC and the presidents] needed to do this, and sort of live up to what the community expects of them,” he said.
Still, organizers stressed that there is more work to be done at the 5Cs and beyond to prioritize environmental justice.
“[This] should just be the beginning of the investments that they are making in environmental justice,” Slevin said.
The original text of this article was later updated to most accurately reflect students’ roles in the “Claremont Off Fossil Fuels” proposal’s approval.
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