The organization Renewable Energy Long Island is alive and well—even though renewable energy is being opposed by the Trump administration, and Governor Kathy Hochul is delaying implementation of New York State’s climate goals, which are predicated on more carbon-free, clean renewable power.
Nevertheless, under Melissa Griffiths Parrott, RELI’s executive director since 2023, succeeding Gordian Raacke, it is busy promoting—as its website declares—“clean, sustainable energy across Long Island. We support and advocate for all forms of renewable energy—including solar, offshore wind, battery storage, and geothermal and more—to help accelerate the transition to a 100% renewable energy economy. Through public education, collaboration with local governments, and partnerships with community groups, RELI works to drive the systemic changes needed to make clean energy accessible and widespread.”
Parrott’s experience in renewable energy and as a climate action advocate is deep. She founded Students for Climate Action, which, with RELI, last month co-sponsored a “2026 Long Island Youth Climate Summit,” bringing together at Stony Brook University more than 200 middle and high school students from all over Long Island. “Our theme of the day is climate optimism,” said Parrott in opening the event. Parrott also said: “There’s a lot of work to do. It’s going to be hard, but we can do it.”
Parrott has joined with municipalities on Long Island in moving clean energy goals forward, is a partner of the New York State Energy Development Agency’s Long Island Clean Energy Hub, is a member of the Long Island Wind Works Coalition, and helped champion New York State’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, enacted into law in 2019.
A Sayville resident, she worked doing environmental education and outreach at the Central Pine Barrens Commission, at Cornell Cooperative Extension, and earlier, for the Executive Office of Environmental Affairs of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. She was chair of the Long Island chapter of former Vice President Al Gore’s Climate Reality Project.
The roots of RELI involve one of the most audacious acts in the history of Suffolk County government: a lawsuit brought by the county under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The RICO Act is a federal law aimed at combating organized crime and targeting individuals involved in a “pattern” of criminal activity. It provides penalties of up to 20 years in prison for leaders of such organizations, massive fines, and forfeiture of profits.
But the target of Suffolk County was the utility then operating here. Its lawsuit’s title: “County of Suffolk v. Long Island Lighting Co.”
For 20 years, a battle had raged against the plan by LILCO to build many nuclear power plants in Suffolk. In 1987, with the lawsuit, Suffolk County, along with individual plaintiffs, charged LILCO and its top officials, including its former president, Wilfred O. Uhl, with making “deliberate misrepresentations to the New York Public Service Commission about the Shoreham and Jamesport nuclear power plant projects in order to obtain rate increases” for their construction.
LILCO had built one nuclear plant at Shoreham and planned to build two more there and another four farther east along the Long Island Sound at Jamesport.
After a two-month trial, a jury found LILCO guilty and meted out a $22.9 million fine. But the U.S. District Court judge in the case, Jack Weinstein, concerned about federal jurisdiction and also how the verdict could lead to a class action on behalf of all LILCO ratepayers costing LILCO billions of dollars and driving it into bankruptcy, set aside the jury’s verdict.
However, he facilitated a settlement. It included a reduction in LILCO electric rates by $390 million over 10 years and creation of a Citizens Advisory Panel. Appointed as its executive director was Gordon Raacke, an environmentally committed engineer from East Hampton. There were 13 unpaid members. It was to be a watchdog of LILCO. It sought to replace LILCO’s nuclear power obsession with a Long Island energy future emphasizing renewable energy.
LILCO subsequently went out of business, a Long Island Power Authority was established by the state and replaced LILCO. The Citizens Advisory Panel transitioned in 2003 to becoming Renewable Energy Long Island. Raacke was also its executive director and, on his retirement, was succeeded by Parrott, its deputy executive director. Raacke remains on RELI’s board.
Parrott, although raised in California, knows Suffolk County well. “I love Fire Island,” she said in an interview last week, citing summers at her father’s beach house in Davis Park. And when she “moved east,” she noted, her first job here was at the Sweetbriar Nature Center in Smithtown.
Although the Citizens Advisory Panel was financed at $300,000 annually from the settlement, RELI has been supported largely by grants, including those from foundations. Parrott has a staff of two: program manager Daniel Busi of Huntington and program coordinator Danielle Moore of Selden.
She is critical of the Trump administration’s disapproval of renewable energy, especially its opposition to Long Island offshore wind projects. As to Governor Hochul, Parrott is critical of her recent call for a delay in implementation of the goals of the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act.
Parrott’s original career goal was television broadcasting. She holds a degree in Radio/TV and Film from California State University, Long Beach. But she has happily transitioned to environmental education.
At the “2026 Long Island Youth Climate Summit,” the keynote address was delivered by Heather White, an author and founder of One Green Thing, an organization based in Montana that emphasizes dealing with “climate anxiety” through action. “We are the ones that are going to get us through this. No one is coming to save us. It’s up to all of us,” she said.
Adrienne Esposito, executive director of Farmingdale-based Citizens Campaign for the Environment, the first speaker, told the youngsters: “You matter. Your voice matters.”
Other speakers included Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine, who spoke about issues he deemed “critical” to Long Island, including solar energy.
The students participated in an exercise to identify their own “superpowers,” and joined breakout groups to discuss how they could apply their strengths to environmental action.