International

Local Climate Progress Worldwide Captured in New ICLEI Report

Right now, in the absence of any international climate agreement (or national, for that matter), local climate action is what the world can count on. That's the takeaway from a new report release over the weekend by ICLEI's World Secretariat.

The carbonn Cities Climate Registry (cCCR) Annual Report was released at COP17 in Durban, South Africa on the world stage, to show the global community what goals local governments have set to mitigate climate change, what they've achieved so far, and what they can accomplish down the road, especially if their efforts are empowered by national and international agreements.

View the Report

This groundbreaking report, the first global snapshot of local climate action, quantified the performance of 51 cities in 19 countries, representing 83 million inhabitants and 447 million tons of C02e emissions per year.

The report underscores the importance of not only measuring GHG emissions to track performance, but to report those emissions to a platform like cCCR. ICLEI has long promoted the maxim, "you cannot manage what you cannot measure," and now we can to that, "we cannot count what we do not report."

What Have Cities Accomplished?

Here are the main takeaways from the report, pulled from the report summary, as well as recommendations for future action:

ICLEI Building Clean and Efficient Cities in India

View a 10-minute summary of a three-year undertaking, the Urban Climate Project: Building Clean and Efficient Cities (UCP). This short documentary highlights the actions developed by a joint initiative of ICLEI, the National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA) and the U.S. Department of State: Asia Pacific Partnership.

Through the UCP, ICLEI assisted two Indian cities, Rajkot and Coimbatore, to implement green and energy-efficient infrastructure projects and pilot demonstrations. The UCP process involved measuring the greenhouse gas emissions from the two cities, and then working with the cities to help implement projects and pilot demonstrations. The two cities are now serving as models in a replicate process for over 60 other cities in India as well as cities throughout the developing world.

Take a Tour of Europe's Most Resilient, Sustainable Cities

ICLEI USA invites you to participate in a rare and exciting opportunity to tour four leading European cities that have successfully implemented innovative climate policies and sustainability initiatives. ICLEI's Resilient Cities Study Tour 2011 brings you four cities in fourteen days, filled with networking and collaboration opportunities, and countless first-hand experiences, and new ideas to bring home to your community. Hurry and register: Only 15 spots are available!

Join an international delegation of experts and local government staff and elected officials who will visit Dresden, Rotterdam, Bonn and Freiburg.

India and ICLEI: Partners in Sustainability

Martin Chávez, ICLEI USA Executive Director, addresses attendees at the New Delhi
International Conference on Cities and Climate Change in New Delhi India, from
Feb. 21-22, 2011.

Environmental concerns transcend national boundaries, and battling climate change is absolutely a cooperative international effort. Droughts, floods and erratic weather patterns are global issues and ICLEI USA continues to be on the forefront of empowering local governments throughout the world to address climate protection and sustainability efforts with proven tools, technical resources and expertise. Through a generous grant from the U.S. Department of State, ICLEI USA, in collaboration with ICLEI South Asia, is helping local governments in India address climate change through the Urban Climate Project (UCP): Building Clean and Efficient Cities. The UCP, which is part of the Asia Pacific Partnership (APP) program, is a three year project designed to help make infrastructure development in India cleaner and more efficient.

A Golden Opportunity in China’s Cities

Beijing. Photo credit: http2007 via flickr

The Climate Group recently released a report highlighting the transformational way in which Chinese cities are implementing low-carbon growth. Working in cooperation with the private sector and with the backing and direction of the central government, cities are transforming economically and industrially in the context of a national plan for low-carbon growth. As part of that effort, China has embarked on a groundbreaking initiative to turn five provinces and eight cities into “low-carbon economy pilots.” Comprehensive plans for low-carbon development have now been released for each of these cities, announcing to the world that local governments in China are serious about leadership on climate change.

Reflections on Cancún from a Local Government Perspective

Originally posted on the Renewable Energy World blog.

Nations and local governments alike emerged from the global climate talks in Cancún with a set of hard fought advancements found in “The Cancún Agreements.”  It is now time for the world to continue with this positive momentum by tackling the work of creating and implementing a global solution – one where nations respect and support the power of local action.

As I returned home to the US from the 16th annual Conference of Parties (COP16), I was struck by this year’s remarkable achievement, despite widespread doubts that we could drive positive change.  From my perspective as a three-term Mayor, I was particularly encouraged by the outcome and the prospects for further climate action during next year’s Climate Summit in Durban, South Africa.  Local governments have been waging the fight against catastrophic climate change for more than 20 years and in the process attracting business, creating jobs and increasing the quality of life of their citizens.  If we can do it well in our cities and our counties – the rest of the world will eventually catch on and catch up.

Martin Chávez Discusses Sustainability With Chinese Delegation

ICLEI USA Executive Director Martin Chávez and Yuan Xikum, a member of the
Standing Committee of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in Beijing’s
Chaoyang District

On the heels of the COP16 Summit in Cancún, ICLEI USA Executive Director Martin Chávez met with a delegation from China to discuss how Chinese provinces can improve their cooperation on sustainability and climate action.

The Chinese delegation was led by Yuan Xikum, a member of the Standing Committee of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in Beijing’s Chaoyang District. Yuan met with Chávez to discuss avenues of increased cooperation on the development of effective methods to improve environmental quality in several Chinese regions, including Yunnan Province, Guizhou Province, and Beijing’s Chaoyang District.  The meeting was one of several by Chinese officials with heads of nongovernmental organizations and leading public figures in the United States over the past two weeks.

Reporting from Cancún: As Climate Talks Continue, Local Governments Move Ahead with Concrete Actions

First published on National Geographic's The Great Energy Challenge Blog.

As the slow-moving conference on climate change gets underway in Cancún, the 193 nations present at the talks don’t seem to agree on much of anything. There is little hope that China and the United States will get past their differences on transparency reporting and other key sticking points, which made the Copenhagen agreements difficult to sustain.

An altogether different scenario is getting underway on the local level.  Mayors and local government representatives who are on the front line of the planet’s fight against a changing climate don’t have the luxury of time; they are moving forward with concrete climate actions with the understanding that there is simply no time to waste.

World Mayors Sign Climate Change Pact

The World Mayors Summit on Climate, held in Mexico City on Nov. 21 in partnership with ICLEI, resulted in the Mexico City Pact. Representative from 138 cities in 43 counties signed the Pact and agreed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These leading cities include Bogotá, Johannesburg, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paolo, Paris, Istanbul, Barcelona, Nantes, Kyoto and Nagoya. Each city has committed to adopting a slate of measures to mitigate climate change, and will take part in the carbonn Cities Climate Registry (cCCR) , a global GHG reporting platform for local goverments. 

The summit, hosted by World Mayors Council on Climate Change President and Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, brought together mayors from around the world, assembling 3,000 local and regional leaders to discuss climate change. "We have to tell the international community that it’s in the cities that the battle to slow global warming will be won,” Ebrard said in the lead-up to the meeting.

The Mexico City Pact will be presented to the United Nations Framework Convention for Climate Change (UNFCCC) when it meets later this month in Cancun, Mexico. View the pact here.

Meet the ICLEI USA Team in Copenhagen

With the eyes of the world on Copenhagen, we wanted to let you know who is representing you – ICLEI USA members – here at the international climate negotiations known as COP15. The official ICLEI USA delegation is an all-star lineup with a packed schedule:

Mayor Patrick Hays, North Little Rock, Arkansas: As President of the ICLEI USA Board, Mayor Hays will represent all of us at a number of high profile events including the Copenhagen Mayors Summit and a panel discussion with Mayor Bloomberg of New York, Wisconsin Governor Doyle and Nancy Sutley from the White House. 

Mayor Frank Cownie, Des Moines, Iowa: ICLEI USA Board Treasurer Mayor Cownie will also attend the Copenhagen Mayors Summit and represent his city, the Midwest and us at a number of event including one sponsored by the State Department. 

Mayor Pegeen Hanrahan, Gainesville, Florida: ICLEI USA Board Secretary Mayor Hanrahan is also here as part of the Florida delegation. In addition to that role, she will speak at a State Department-sponsored event and will help ICLEI USA launch our new Measuring Up report of US local government targets and progress.

Supervisor Valerie Brown, Sonoma County, California: In addition to serving on the ICLEI USA Board of Directors, Supervisor Brown is President of the National Association of Counties and, as such, stays busy here in Copenhagen with many speaking engagements. She will also attend the Copenhagen Mayors Summit.

Mayor Marty Chavez, Albuquerque, New Mexico: As a member of the ICLEI USA Board of Directors and ICLEI Global Executive Committee, Mayor Chavez is here touting his city’s incredible progress on water and climate issues as well as working to improve this organization. 

Clerk of Courts Harvey Ruvin, Miami-Dade County, Florida: Also both a member of the ICLEI USA Board and ICLEI Global Executive Committee, Mr. Ruvin brings years of experience on local climate action and stories from the frontlines of climate impacts in highly vulnerable south Florida to Copenhagen.

Wish them luck as they have their work cut out for them this week, and we’ll keep reporting live from COP15 in Copenhagen!