đ Tackling Climate Change: A Race We Can Win Together! đââď¸đââď¸
Mitigating climate change is both a sprint and a marathon. The challenge? We need to cut our emissions and local air pollution drastically in the near term while investing in projects that can have sustained impact over time. The good news? The Biden Administration’s Inflation Reduction Act has provided billions of dollars in federal funding to support climate action. If we make a compelling emissions reduction plan, we can apply for implementation funds to execute.
Itâs also an important time and opportunity for us to take stock, learn from the experiences we had the previous year, and to continue to improve our programs, services, and operations.
While we engage with Salt Lakers mostly through recycling questions and efforts, we do so much more! Here are some highlights from 2023 and keep a lookout for more details in our Year-in-Review booklet coming soon. (In the meantime, you can take a look at previous annual reports for 2022 and 2021.) Some notable achievements include:
Recycling can be confusing. So, last week we had an informal Waste & Recycling Q&A on Instagram. We got some great questions and wanted to share them here on the blog!
Walking is undoubtedly the most straightforward way to move around; humans have been doing it forever! Studies show that people are happiest and healthiest when they live in walkable communities. Walking is also beneficial to the environment and the economy. Despite these findings, in 2021 the average American commute reached an all-time high of 27.6 driving minutes each way. In the United States, only about 3-4% of commuters walk to work, which is sadly unsurprising based on the car-centric construction of many U.S. cities.
During the month of July, Salt Lake City is encouraging people to drive less in favor of walking, biking, and public transit as part of the Clear the Air Challenge. In 2022, this challenge was responsible for a reduction in over 53,000 trips and prevention of over 392 tons of CO2. This year, Salt Lake City employees and other residents will join teams and log their trips to compete and work towards a collective goal of saving 100,000 trips this year.
One of the many ways Salt Lake City works to improve air quality is by making it easier to own an electric vehicle, which doesn’t emit any tailpipe pollution.
This will enable more residents to charge their vehicles at home if they live in a new multi-family building.
The electric vehicle readiness standards were adopted as part of the Off-Street Parking ordinance (21A.44) and will require multi-family new-construction properties to include electric vehicle ready (EV-ready) infrastructure at 20% of installed parking spaces. It does not require that the EV stations themselves be installed; only the electric capacity and conduit to make it that much easier to put in a station as demand increases.
As 2022 comes to a close, we want to give you an update on the exciting and important work thatâs been happening with our goals and the program this year.
Weâve been steadily developing the governance structure and outlines of the program since it became established in state statute after the passage of HB 411 in 2019. You can learn more about the beginnings of this program and our carbon goals here.
This year we celebrated a total of 18 communities moving forward as of the July 2022 participation deadline. (There will still be another voteâlikely in late 2023âby each participating communityâs council to decide whether to participate in the final program once it’s approved by the Public Service Commission.)
The 18 communities form whatâs called the Community Renewable Energy Agency, the interlocal government cooperative working to design this Program.
And, together, we can have a big impact on renewable energy development in the state and region! Collectively our communities represent about 25% of the electricity that Rocky Mountain Power sells in Utah.
The Program will bring new renewable energy resources to serve Salt Lake City and participating communities, so that by 2030, the amount of electricity we use annually will be matched by renewable generation.
This means the Community Renewable Energy Program has the potential to source 25% of the electricity the utility sells in Utah from renewable energy!
This is important because climate scientists agree that in order to avert the worst impacts of climate change on our health, ecosystems, economies, and societies, global emissions must be halved by 2030 and reach net zero by 2050.
Developing and implementing the Community Renewable Energy Program is one of leading strategies that Salt Lake City and other participating communities are taking to #ActOnClimate in line with these science-backed targets.
The holiday season can be a time of joy, time spent with friends and family, gift giving, good food, and rewatching our favorite comfort movies. Itâs also a time when thinking about and acting on sustainable alternatives is important!
Holidays bring about plastic and paper waste, increased travel emissions, food waste, and the never-ending debate over plastic versus real trees. Check out some our tips for navigating this holiday season as sustainably as possible!
Shop local:
Weâve talked about the importance of shopping local for our food, but shopping local for gifts is also important! Keeping our shopping to our local, small businesses helps support the local economy. Additionally, shopping locally minimizes carbon emissions because travel is minimized for consumers and purveyors. Supporting small, local businesses also helps to sustain our town centers and can help reduce sprawl and automobile use!
Food waste:
Food waste is a major issues even outside of the holiday season- about 40% of all food produced in the US never gets eaten. This amount increases by an additional 25% between Thanksgiving and New Years! Here are a couple of easy ways to minimize your food waste:
Plan ahead! Figure out your menu ahead of time and plan for the amount of people who will be attending your event. Try and plan foods that you will enjoy eating as leftovers or can repurpose into other dishes (like turkey soup, curry, or sandwiches!). Consider doing more plant-based options for an increased impact!
Compost! Any of the raw fruit and vegetable scraps created in the cooking of your delicious feast can go into your compost bin to be turned into compost for you to use during the next planting season! Learn more about composting in SLC here.
Send people home with leftovers! Tell your guests to bring their own to-go containers to help you eat through any remaining leftovers.
Thanksgiving can be a difficult holiday for those practicing vegetarianism or veganism- with food being such a focal point and the main dish often being meat based. While there are other ways to contribute towards a sustainable lifestyle, how we eat is a major player in our individual carbon footprints. In Utah, these choices contribute to nearly 25% of our household carbon footprint. Learn more about Dining with Discretion and the importance of understanding the intricacy of our food systems!
A vegetarian Thanksgiving can be easy, there are vegetarian/vegan roasts you can get at the store, but thereâs something about creating a flavorful dish to share with your guests that took preparation and dedication. We wanted to make this holiday a little easier for our vegetarian and vegan friends this year so we made a menu, just for you!
A year-long effort to create solutions for Black-, Indigenous-, and People of Color- (BIPOC) owned businesses on the Westside of Salt Lake City to pursue rooftop solar and battery storage has received a significant boost thanks to a commitment from American Express.
American Express recently announced a $5 million global commitment to help cities build resiliency and fight climate change ahead of the United Nations Climate Change Conference which took place in Egypt last week. The Urban Sustainability Directors Network (USDN) has been awarded $1.2 million to work with three cities, including Salt Lake City, to install solar energy systems in our community.
American Express will provide $325,000 in philanthropic support to complement other incentives and financial strategies to help install solar with optional battery systems for small businesses on the Westside. These systems can lower energy costs for residents and businesses, can be more resilient than standard electric sources during extreme weather, support local clean energy jobs, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
View of the Utah State Capital Building from 500 North.
âIâm thrilled with American Expressâ generosity, which will build off the hard work our City team and partners have done to advance solar on our Westside,â said Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall. âWe have the tools to reduce climate emissions, strengthen community resiliency, and save our businesses and residents money through clean energy, and this collaboration is a perfect demonstration of that.â
November 1 is the official start of inversion season along the Wasatch Front and it certainly feels like winter is settling in around us!
But what exactly is an inversion? This natural phenomenon occurs when a high-pressure system is setting up, trapping cold air on the valley floors with warmer air above it. This warm air also traps all our pollution with the cold air, keeping it contained in the valley until the inversion breaks.
What causes an inversion?
Meteorologists on the news and the Utah Division of Air Quality will warn you in advance before an inversion happens. Here are some signs that you can keep a look out for:
Calm winds: this reduces the natural mixing of air temperatures.
Clear skies: this increases the rate of cooling for air close to the ground.
Long nights allow the cooling of the ground to continue over a longer period of time, resulting in a greater decrease in temperature near the surface.
The sun is lower on the horizon during the winter, so it supplies less warmth to the earthâs surface and more to the atmosphere.
In Utah, our inversions often occur right after snowstorms due to the increase in cold air near the ground and the clear skies warming up the upper atmosphere and acting as a lid to the cooler air below.
Inversions are meteorological events that are common in mountain/valley geographies with our weather patterns. When you pair inversions with human activity, you often wind up with pollution that sticks around. Here along the Wasatch Front, a significant source of pollution comes from transportation(roughly 50%), as well as our homes and buildings (roughly 35%). That means each of us can make a difference to our air quality.
slcGreen Blog 