WHAT WE ARE SEEKING
Seattle residents are passionate, committed and creative when to comes to making Seattle—and the world—better places. As individuals and as a community, Seattleites have helped our community become a national and international leader in sustainability. And, we know the community has more great ideas about how we can continue to be leaders by taking action at the neighborhood level to address climate change.

The City of Seattle is seeking community partners to help residents and businesses take action for the climate. We will be awarding contracts up to $7,000 for the projects, and will be providing on-going project design support.

If you have an idea about how to inspire your community to make positive choices that support the environment, we want to work with you to make it happen! We are accepting applications for projects in the following categories:

Transportation
Energy
Food
Waste

WHO SHOULD APPLY
Organizations or individuals with a good idea who want to partner with the City to help their community take climate action.  No idea is too big or too small! More information at www.seattlecan.org

HOW TO APPLY
Download a proposal form and submit it by 4:00 pm on April 27, 2012
Email: Sara.Wysocki@seattle.gov
Fax: 206-684-3013
Mail: PO Box 94729, Seattle, WA 98124-4729

QUESTIONS?
Email Sara Wysocki or call 206.233.7014

The first discussion, Building a Strong, Healthy Economy for Real Results, is Wednesday, December, 14, from noon to 1:30 in the Boards & Commissions Room in Seattle City Hall. The discussion will be moderated by Councilmembers Tim Burgess and Sally Clark and feature panelists with knowledge and expertise in what it takes to create a thriving green economy.   

This lunchtime discussion is free. Please RSVP here. Can’t make it? Take a 5-10 minute survey online to let us know your thoughts.

The Seattle Climate Action Plan will lay out a roadmap for how Seattle can become a carbon neutral city by 2050. Technical Advisory Groups (TAGs) are already meeting and working on identifying strategies for how we can reduce our greenhouse gases in the transportation, building energy and waste sectors. Please join us to learn more about the Climate Action Plan update and to share your ideas for making Seattle a climate-friendly community.

What: Great City Brownbag – Seattle Climate Action Plan
When: Thursday, November 10, 12:00 – 1:30 pm
Where: GGLO’s Space on the Steps 1301 1st Avenue, in Downtown Seattle (About 1/4th of the way down the Harbor Steps).

As we start this work however, we need to hear from you. What are your ideas for how we can get to carbon neutral in the future? What strategies would you support?

Please take the Climate Action Plan survey now. It only takes 10 minutes and it’s important for us to hear from as many people as possible!

The resolution also serves to launch the Climate Action Plan update. As part of the planning process, the Office of Sustainability and Environment will engage the community to help identify climate action priorities and convene technical advisory groups to analyze and recommend specific strategies for reducing the city’s greenhouse emissions in the transportation, building energy and waste sectors.

City residents and businesses are encouraged to participate in an online survey about transportation and energy choices, the two biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions in Seattle. The Office of Sustainability and Environment will also reach out directly to community groups to engage them throughout the planning process.

To schedule a climate action plan presentation for your community group, email climateactionplan@seattle.gov.

The survey should take about 15 minutes. Please take it here.

Getting to Zero: A Pathway to a Carbon Neutral Seattle, a report developed by Stockholm Environment Institute, evaluated the emissions reduction potential of a range of strategies including increased transit service, expanded bike and pedestrian infrastructure, increased building efficiency and switching from fossil fuels to less carbon-intensive alternatives. Seattle is currently considering formally adopting a climate protection goal of zero net emissions by 2050 and this report was developed to explore the technical feasibility of that goal. Through the city’s climate action planning process, city staff and sector experts will also consider economic and political factors and recommend actions to move the city toward this goal. The planning process will start in the fall with the final action plan anticipated to be complete by next summer.

 Carbon Neutral Analysis Documents

Getting to Zero: A Pathway to a Carbon Neutral Seattle

Technical Appendix (documenting the approach and assumptions for the analysis)

Presentation for City Council briefing on Carbon Neutral Analysis

 Seattle has been an affiliate partner of the C40 since 2006. As such, we have the opportunity to learn from what other cities are doing and contribute our own best practices. In addition, C40 has asked participating cities to voluntarily disclose their carbon emissions, reduction targets and action planning processes in order to establish a baseline to measure project effectiveness going forward.

 C40 partnered with the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) to gather the data and compile it into a report, released this week. Over 3,000 organizations in some 60 countries around the world  measure and disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, water management and climate change strategies through CDP. Seattle took part in the C40 disclosure project conducted earlier this year.

Seattle conducts a greenhouse gas inventory of its municipal operations (corporate inventory) annually, and an inventory of the entire community’s footprint every three years. These reports can be found on the Office of Sustainability & Environment’s climate protection page. The 2008/09 corporate inventory will be available shortly and OSE will be conducting the 2011 community inventory next year.

In order to achieve this goal, we need the support of the community as well. Together, we have the power to make a big difference in our climate impact.

To help us better align our efforts with what works for the community, we would love your thoughts to the following two questions:

• What do you think would  motivate people to take action/change their behaviors in ways that help reduce carbon emissions?

• What do you think the main barriers are to people changing their practices and behaviors in ways that help reduce carbon emissions?

Submit your responses via the comments section of this post.