The L.A. League of Conservation Voters endorsed Garcetti and Greuel. The L.A. League of Conservation voters has made the maximum $1,300 donations to both candidates*.  Each of them has endorsed Environment California's proposal for the city to get more solar panels on homes. And both said they would work with Gov. Jerry Brown on a range of issues, such as reforming environmental regulations. That should make the Natural Resources Defense Council happy, though its nonprofit status prevents the group from officially weighing in.

One of the only groups to choose one over the other has been the Sierra Club. The group endorsed Eric Garcetti at the beginning of February, splitting with Greuel after a dozen years of supporting both politicians.

Michelle Kinman, a clean energy advocate at Environment California, said L.A.'s Department of Water and Power is in "transformative" decade. A third of the city's power must come from renewable sources by 2020, and Kinman's focus is to make rooftop solar a significant portion of that.
 
Less than 1 percent of L.A.'s electricity comes from sun right now, Kinman said.

"All eyes are on DWP," she said. "It can really have a great impact on how other utilities across the country determine their utility mix."

Garcetti and Greuel both agreed that L.A. should generate 20 percent of the city's peak summertime electricity needs by 2020 through installations of solar panels on homes, schools and businesses.

Greuel, notably, is being supported by the union representing most DWP workers and several business organizations. The union has spent millions on commercials advocating Angelenos to vote for Greuel.

Kinman said she hasn't had conversations with unions. But the Los Angeles Business Council is on board. The three other leading mayoral candidates haven't responded to requests to endorse the goal of 20 percent rooftop solar.

Up in Sacramento, the NRDC is focused on the governor's push to change parts of the California Environmental Quality Act that he says are an impediment to economic development. David Pettit, the NRDC's Southern California Air Program leader, said stakeholders have been meeting to find a solution amenable to everyone.

"We're both on offense and defense," he said. "There's some things we would like to change, too."

Among those changes groups like the NRDC want is ensuring that the affect of the environment on development projects is studied just as a project's affect on the environment is reviewed.

"If you wanted to build a home in the Santa Monica Mountains, you wouldn't have to look at the brush fire risk right now," Pettit said.

On the other side of the ball, the NRDC's trying to kill a legislative proposal that it says would exempt nearly project from CEQA.

"It would make it irrelevant," he said. "To people in L.A., where traffic is important, analysis of traffic and air pollution is threatened."

Garcetti and Greuel didn't directly answer questions about CEQA reform, though Garcetti said he "would work hand in glove with the governor looking at the long-term stability of the state."

*Clarification on Feb. 27: L.A. League of Conservation Voters, not the California League, made these donations.

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