Pittsburgh Climate Initiative

On Friday, researchers at the Mauna Loa Laboratory in Hawaii announced that for the first time in over 800,000 years, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 surpassed 400 parts per million. While the UN has established a goal of keeping CO2 emissions under 450 ppm, most climate scientists advise that 350 ppm is the safe level.

Read more from National Geographic and the New York Times.

What does this mean? While every area of the world may be affected differently, it means a continuing shift in weather patterns and climate that will lead to rising sea levels, stronger storm events, increasing droughts in many parts of the country and flooding in others. Learn more about CO2 levels at 400.350.org.

Communicating climate science, risk, and what people can do is an ongoing challenge for PCI and other climate-related organizations. We welcome your feedback on what you find helpful or confusing about climate messaging.

The City of Pittsburgh is well on its way toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions by twenty percent in the next decade, according to the Pittsburgh Climate Initiative (PCI).

PCI reports that over half of the recommendations in the Pittsburgh Climate Action Plan, v. 2.0 have already been completed or are in-progress, just one year after the plan was adopted.

The plan is an update to a 2008 climate action plan and includes 126 specific recommendations for reducing greenhouse gas emissions throughout the city.  Of those, 33 have been completed and 44 others have been implemented and are in progress. Examples include purchasing at least fifteen percent of electricity used by the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority from renewable energy sources, upgrading Pittsburgh Housing Authority buildings for energy efficiency and reducing energy use in city government buildings by twenty percent over five years.

The plan includes both government operations as well as private businesses.  Local corporations, including Bayer, BNY Mellon, Highmark, UPMC, Eaton Corporation, Del Monte Foods, evolve:ea, and Pashek Associates have already collectively saved over $4.2 million, 67 million kilowatt hours of energy and 91 million gallons of water, through the Green Workplace Challenge. Colleges and universities are also involved in this effort through the 11-member Higher Education Climate Consortium.

Community members have also gotten involved through the Black and Gold City Goes Green campaign. Participants have reported actions that together have added up to an annual reduction of more than eight million pounds of carbon dioxide.

Examples of recommendations from the 2008 plan that have been successfully accomplished include hiring a city sustainability coordinator and creating a Sustainability Commission,  improving recycling in the City-County Building, retrofitting streetlights to be more efficient, helping businesses complete greenhouse gas emissions inventories, establishing a Higher Education Climate Consortium and completing greenhouse gas inventories for most of the colleges and universities in Pittsburgh.

While the 2008 plan recommendations focused largely on preliminary steps, the updated plan focuses much more on measurable actions. Because only three percent of greenhouse gas emissions in Pittsburgh are the result of government operations, a goal in 2013 is to engage more residents and businesses in climate protection efforts.

While much of the media attention on climate change has focused on the effects to sensitive species and ecosystems, PCI urges Pittsburghers to recognize the predicted impacts of climate change on our region, including higher summer temperatures, longer heat waves and a greater incidence of torrential downpours and flash flooding. As an area already challenged by poor air quality, flooding, and combined-sewer overflows, the Pittsburgh region has a clear incentive to reduce the effects of climate change.

The Telegraph recently reported that the UK’s Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor Sir John Beddington, offered grave warnings regarding climate change as he steps down from his position. He explained that because of the lag time between when greenhouse gases are released into the atmosphere and the resulting effects, while we wait for world leaders to agree on an emissions reduction strategy, GHG are “still climbing, and when that increase is reversed, we will be left with the weather and the climate for the next 25 years from whenever that happens.”

The article noted that Beddington “admitted there were some ‘uncertainties’ in the analysis of climate change but stressed that there was clear evidence that it is happening in the way that climate models suggest.”

Read the full story here.

Source: “World faces decades of climate chaos, outgoing chief scientific adviser warns” by Sam Marsden, from The Telegraph, March 25, 2013

The Pittsburgh region’s skilled workforce can be a leader in developing job-creating clean energy solutions to the climate crisis, like solar, wind, geothermal and efficiency — that create jobs here in Pittsburgh.

WHAT: Earth Day Town Hall – Double Down on Clean Energy
WHO: The Sierra Club, the Blue Green Alliance, the United Steelworkers, Clean Energy Developers, and others.
WHEN: Monday, April 22 at 6 p.m.
WHERE: United Steelworkers Building, 60 Blvd of the Allies, Pittsburgh, PA 15222 (map)

Panelists:
Khari Mosley - Blue Green Alliance (Moderator)
Dewitt Walton - United Steelworkers Union
Sharon Pillar - Consultant/Advocate for solar energy and climate change
Joel Thomas - Manager, Business Development, Community Energy, Inc.
David Hassenzahl – Dean and Professor, School of Sustainability and the Environment, Chatham University

RSVP: http://action.sierraclub.org/PittsburghEarthDayTownHall

Questions?: Contact Randy Francisco at randy.francisco@sierraclub.org

In a press release, the U.S. EPA yesterday announced the release of its 18th annual report of overall U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions showing a 1.6 percent decrease in 2011 from the previous year. Recent trends can be attributed to multiple factors including reduced emissions from electricity generation, improvements in fuel efficiency in vehicles with reductions in miles traveled, and year-to-year changes in the prevailing weather.

GHGs are the primary driver of climate change, which can lead to hotter, longer heat waves that threaten the health of the sick, poor or elderly; increases in ground-level ozone pollution linked to asthma and other respiratory illnesses; as well as other threats to the health and welfare of Americans. GHG emissions in 2011 showed a 6.9 percent drop below 2005 levels. Total emissions of the six main greenhouse gases in 2011 were equivalent to 6,702 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. These gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulfur hexafluoride.

More on the greenhouse gas inventory report, visit the EPA Climate Change website.

The Pittsburgh Greenspace Alliance is hosting a Mayoral Candidate Forum on April 24th at the Heinz History Center to hear the candidates’ thoughts on parks, open space, and trails in the City of Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh Climate Initiative is a proud supported of this event as a “Friend of the Forum.” Please join us at this free event. More information and registration information is available at http://pghgreenspacealliance.wordpress.com

March Madness is in full swing and basketball fans everywhere are eagerly checking their brackets. In the spirit of this basketball fever, the consultants at Booz Allen Hamilton have created a tool to see what the carbon footprint of your bracket would be. The tool calculates the greenhouse gas emissions associated with each team’s travel in all possible scenarios. According to a news release from the firm,

• The bracket with Louisville winning the tournament would have the smallest carbon footprint in the men’s tournament
• The bracket with St. Mary’s winning the tournament would have the largest carbon footprint in the men’s tournament
• The bracket with Maryland winning the tournament would have the smallest carbon footprint in the women’s tournament
• The bracket with UCLA winning the tournament would have the largest carbon footprint impact in the women’s tournament

Try out the tool today at boozallen.com.

Pittsburgh’s trees provide value to our city, including capturing stormwater, providing energy savings from shade, cleaning the air, and increasing property values. Recently Tree Pittsburgh undertook an effort to assign a value to these benefits. They found that even though the City spends $850,000 annually on tree maintenance, it receives approximately $3.00 in benefits for every dollar spent. This project helped to convince the city to create a master plan for continued tree maintenance to ensure the street trees are healthy for years to come. Read more here.