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0:11

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0:13

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If you're someone working at the city or municipal

1:00

level, moving the needle on a global

1:02

issue like climate change is harder than

1:04

it sounds. It was just like

1:06

a lot of whereas is. Whereas,

1:08

whereas, we're going to do this, this and this and

1:11

then it was more how do we make this real?

1:14

It's Monday, June 24th and you're

1:16

listening to Science Friday. I'm

1:19

Sci-fi producer Charles Bergquist. After

1:21

the Kyoto Protocol climate agreement of the 1990s,

1:24

many cities and municipalities developed

1:26

some kind of climate or

1:28

sustainability action plans. But

1:30

have they made a difference? This episode,

1:33

we'll talk about the challenge of bringing climate

1:35

goals to the local front. Here's

1:37

Sci-fi's John Dankoski. Climate

1:41

change is a global issue. And

1:43

so when we think about getting

1:45

carbon out of the atmosphere, we

1:47

often think about really big policies.

1:50

I'm talking about international treaties and

1:52

federal infrastructure bills worth billions of

1:54

dollars. But. Good

1:57

evening, everyone. And welcome to Pittsburgh. City

2:00

Council's public hearing for today. Climate policy

2:02

happens closer to home too. Bill

2:05

2028 resolution adopting

2:07

the Pittsburgh Climate Action

2:09

Plan which identifies targets

2:11

and strategies for greenhouse

2:13

gas emissions for the

2:16

city of Pittsburgh. Over the last 30

2:18

years, hundreds of cities across the U.S.

2:20

have adopted their own plans to cut

2:22

emissions. But are city governments on track

2:24

to meet these commitments? And what can

2:27

one city really do about a global

2:29

problem? Susan Scott Peterson is

2:31

a climate reporter in Pittsburgh who's been covering

2:33

this. Welcome to Science Friday, Susan. Thanks so

2:35

much for having me. Okay, to start off,

2:38

tell me why exactly you've been reporting on

2:40

climate policy in cities. Well,

2:42

it actually started because I had something

2:44

I was curious about about my past

2:46

because I used to work in city government.

2:49

This was back when I was in my

2:51

20s and I was in Austin and so

2:53

young and naive and wearing business casual to

2:55

the office every day. And this was back

2:57

in 2008 and we had a climate protection

3:01

plan for the city. And

3:03

I remember feeling at the time like

3:05

climate change is huge and big and

3:07

scary and urgent, but we

3:09

have a plan, right? And so a

3:12

few years later, 2020 came around and

3:14

I just remember wondering like, whatever happened to that?

3:16

Did we ever meet any of those goals? You

3:19

know, it's a great question because I remember

3:22

having the same questions when I started to

3:24

see these goals come across from different cities

3:26

because climate change is a global issue. So what

3:28

difference do you think a city climate plan can

3:30

actually make? Okay, I'm going to start

3:32

by just telling you a little bit about the history of

3:35

this. It kind of got started back in 2005 when

3:38

the world ratified the Kyoto Protocol, which

3:40

was the first big international climate treaty,

3:43

but the US didn't ratify it.

3:45

And that's how cities kind of

3:47

got involved. I talked to

3:49

this woman named Hillary Varnador. Hillary is

3:52

like hilarious. H-I-L-A-R-I and then Varnador is

3:54

via in Victor. And she is the

3:56

vice president for cities at the US

3:58

Green Building Council. And she told

4:00

me when the US didn't ratify Kyoto, that

4:03

was when city mayors all over the country decided

4:05

to do something about it. So they

4:07

got together and they signed on to an agreement

4:09

that was kind of like their own mini Kyoto

4:11

protocol, and they made climate

4:13

promises for their cities. So this

4:16

was like our first big wave

4:18

of mayors saying, even if our

4:20

country isn't gonna sign on and

4:22

participate, we're right here in the front

4:24

lines. And so all of this happened almost 20

4:26

years ago now. And today there

4:28

are hundreds of cities across the US that have

4:31

their own climate policies. Okay, so

4:33

the idea of this is a bunch of

4:35

cities with climate targets is better than nothing.

4:37

Yeah, I think that's kind of it, but I also think

4:39

there are other good reasons for cities to have climate plans.

4:42

One of them is that something like 70% of

4:45

greenhouse gas emissions come from cities. And so if

4:47

you wanna go after climate change, you really need

4:49

policies at the city level. And

4:52

the other thing is that cities are also

4:54

where a lot of the climate impacts are

4:56

happening. There are a lot of people living in

4:58

cities. There's a lot of expensive infrastructure

5:00

and resources to support them. And so when

5:03

there's something like a heat wave or a

5:05

flood or a hurricane, cities are really vulnerable.

5:08

Okay, so when we're talking about a city climate plan,

5:10

what exactly is it? What is one of these things

5:12

look like? So in the beginning,

5:14

it was mostly mayors making proclamations and

5:16

resolutions. This is Hilary Barnador again. It

5:19

was just like a lot of whereas

5:21

is, whereas, whereas, we're gonna

5:23

do this, this, and this. And then it was

5:25

more, how do we make this real? So

5:27

eventually, cities needed to put someone in charge

5:29

of actually doing something. And so

5:32

they created a totally new job. My

5:34

name is Vivian Satterfield, and I'm

5:36

the chief sustainability officer at the

5:38

city of Portland. Ava Richardson, sustainability

5:40

director for the Baltimore City Office.

5:42

My name is Elizabeth Babcock. I'm

5:44

the executive director of Denver's Office

5:46

of Climate Action Sustainability. I'm Flor

5:49

Marion. I'm the assistant director for

5:51

Sustainability and Resilience. And these

5:53

city sustainability officers were in charge of

5:55

figuring out how to turn the mayor's

5:57

resolutions. I call them the whereas's,

5:59

actually. do. Into this

6:01

thing we call a climate action plan, which

6:04

is basically a document with a bunch of

6:06

different strategies like adding renewable

6:08

energy or building bike infrastructure or capturing

6:11

methane from landfills. And all

6:13

of those strategies roll up to a climate goal. Okay,

6:16

a climate goal, what exactly is a climate goal? So it's

6:19

usually a decarbonization goal with a deadline.

6:21

So for example, a lot of cities

6:23

have an 80 by 50 goal, and that

6:25

means an 80% reduction in carbon emissions

6:27

by the year 2050. Okay, I've heard of

6:29

a lot of these. What exactly is a

6:31

target like that based on? I mean, is

6:34

there any science that goes into making these

6:36

goals? Yeah, so the 80 by

6:38

50 goals are roughly aligned with what scientists

6:40

said would limit global warming to about two

6:42

degrees Celsius. But this was back around the

6:45

time of the Kyoto Protocol, and

6:47

the science has changed. So now scientists say we

6:49

should limit warming to one and a half degrees

6:51

Celsius. And so to get there, global

6:54

emissions have to be cut as soon as possible

6:56

to net zero by the year 2050. And most

6:59

cities haven't adopted that target yet. Yeah,

7:02

we see this in a lot of

7:04

areas of science policy, there's this huge

7:06

lag time between the science and the

7:08

actual policy. Right. And I guess I'll

7:10

also add that it is hard for

7:12

cities to update their carbon targets when

7:14

they're in the middle of dealing increasingly

7:16

with actual climate change all at the

7:18

same time. We have

7:20

lots of greenways and urban forests. We're

7:22

very lucky in that sense. Flormarian directs

7:24

sustainability in Pittsburgh, which is where I

7:26

live. And she told me about a

7:28

climate related issue that's started cropping up

7:31

here. But it also

7:33

comes with lots of issues around

7:35

invasive species and precipitation. And

7:37

so the amount of landslide happening around

7:39

the city are increasing. And that's a

7:41

huge budget cost for us. And that

7:43

really struck me what she said about

7:46

landslides being a huge budget cost. Because

7:48

I feel like one of the old cliches about

7:50

city government is that all they do is run

7:52

around fixing potholes. But it's

7:55

almost like landslides are becoming the

7:57

new potholes along with drought and heat

7:59

domes. even

10:00

more complicated is that these cities

10:02

are counting carbon emissions differently. Like

10:05

some cities are only tracking carbon

10:07

from their city government operations, like

10:09

municipal buildings and city vehicle fleets.

10:12

Other places are tracking whole city emissions,

10:14

but they all have their own methodologies.

10:17

So what you're saying is that Portland

10:19

and Pittsburgh aren't even counting the same

10:21

things. Right. So that means

10:23

that you can't compare these cities to each other and you

10:26

really can't make any statements about them overall

10:28

as a group. But what I

10:30

can tell you is what the people in the

10:32

four individual cities I reported on told me. This

10:35

is Kyle Deisner, who is a climate policy analyst for

10:37

the city of Portland. So our

10:39

emissions currently are 21 percent below

10:41

1990 levels. But

10:44

I think it's helpful to understand that from 1990

10:47

our emissions continued to climb until

10:49

2000 and they've

10:51

been falling ever since 2000. So we're

10:53

actually 30 percent below the 2000 peak.

10:56

And so what Portland is reporting here is roughly

10:59

in line with what I heard from the other

11:01

cities, Denver and Pittsburgh and Baltimore. They

11:03

also told me they've cut emissions by between 20 and 30 percent. So

11:07

I don't know. That sounds like pretty good news, doesn't

11:09

it? But is that enough?

11:11

I mean, are we going to save the planet

11:13

with cities cutting 20 and 30 percent of emissions?

11:16

No, no, we're not. We're

11:19

not, of course. So this does not surprise me.

11:21

But tell me more. Yeah. So I

11:23

think the sense I got from my reporting is that

11:25

a lot of the low hanging fruit has already been

11:27

gathered. It gets harder and harder

11:30

to make deeper cuts from here. It's getting

11:32

more urgent. And cities are really running up

11:34

against a lot of barriers. Okay. Like what

11:36

kind of barriers? Well, some of it's just

11:39

political cycles. Like these targets are big public

11:41

mayoral announcements. But then eventually a new mayor

11:43

gets elected and their administration may have different

11:45

priorities. Yeah. I mean, that makes sense, right?

11:48

Different priorities with the administration. Yeah. But so

11:50

there's this other thing that I heard about when I

11:52

was reporting, and it seems very mundane,

11:55

but it's actually a really big deal. And

11:57

that's just that these sustainability directors are spending.

18:00

and I have never met anyone that was just

18:02

there for ease or

18:05

whatever people assumptions are.

18:07

Everybody is really working

18:09

tirelessly to make the city a better

18:11

place for everyone. And that's, I'm

18:14

really proud to work with these people. I

18:16

don't know if we're gonna do all of the work on time, but

18:19

making sure we're bringing joy to

18:22

our community right now is important.

18:26

I asked her where she's finding joy right now. And

18:29

she said that one of the things is the

18:31

new stormwater code. And I

18:34

have to say that as a former city government employee,

18:36

that is my kind of joy. That's

18:39

great, Susan. Thanks so much for your reporting, I

18:41

appreciate it. Thank you for having me. Susan

18:44

Scott Peterson is a climate reporter

18:47

in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. You can read

18:49

more about this issue and what

18:51

cities are doing about it on

18:54

our website, sciencefriday.com/climate policy. That's

18:56

all the time we have for now.

18:59

A lot of folks helped make the

19:01

show happen this week, including. Rasha Uridi.

19:03

Dean Petersmith. Sandy Roberts. Shoshana Buxbaum. And

19:06

many more. Next time, Lost

19:08

Birds, how researchers are harnessing

19:10

crowdsourced data to identify and locate birds

19:13

that haven't been spotted in over a

19:15

decade. But for now,

19:17

I'm Sci-fi producer Charles Bergquist. Thanks for

19:19

listening, we'll see you soon. Douglas

19:25

is one of many who found a new life through

19:28

Seattle's Union Gospel Mission. I was living on

19:30

the streets when I heard this guy talk

19:33

about how he got clean and sober at

19:35

the mission. So I decided to give it

19:37

a try. I could feel something working inside

19:40

of me and I knew I was getting

19:42

better. Today, my number one goal is to

19:44

stay clean and sober. And

19:47

grace will lead me

19:49

home. To hear more,

19:51

volunteer or donate, visit

19:53

ugm.org. No

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