At their September 10th meeting, the Charlotte City Council Environment Committee received an update on the Strategic Energy Action Plan (SEAP) that outlined the timeline and stakeholder engagement process.

Background

On June 25th, the Charlotte City Council unanimously passed the resolution for a “Sustainable and Resilient” Charlotte. This is a comprehensive resolution that calls for the city government to source 100% of its energy used in its own buildings and fleet from zero-carbon sources by 2030. It also creates an action plan for dramatically reducing city-wide greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 with short, medium and long term goals.

City staff has worked with Envision Charlotte and Carbon Captured Ltd. to perform a greenhouse gas emissions inventory and develop the SEAP. The SEAP will provide a pathway for necessary capital investments and operational changes to reduce per person greenhouse gas emissions in all sectors from a 2015 baseline measure of 12 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e).  CO2e is a metric that takes into account different greenhouse gases in a common unit of measurement. The goal is to reduce per person CO2e emissions to 7 tons in 2030 and less than 2 tons in 2050. The plan would be in alignment with the Global Covenant of Mayors commitment that former mayors Clodfelter and Roberts had signed on the city’s behalf as well as the Paris Climate Agreement.

Takeaway

The SEAP will include four core components: Transportation, Buildings, Energy Generation, and Workforce Development. After the SEAP is passed, members of the community and city staff will form working groups around these focus areas to provide guidance for implementing the action items recommended in the SEAP. The SEAP will be a living document with the working groups generating new ideas, and promoting the plan across the city.

City of Charlotte Sustainability Director, Rob Phocas, discussed the 5 Stages to Zero Carbon Energy that will be included in the SEAP:

This graphic guides the way each working group will develop action items and tasks within the SEAP for their respective focus area.

Next Steps

On October 8th, the Environment Committee will be presented with the SEAP for approval to go before the full council. The full council would vote on approving the plan on October 22nd. External stakeholders will be brought together to provide feedback at a public meeting set to occur after the Environment Committee meets but before the full council gathers.

September 10, 2018 Environment Committee Agenda. Watch the video stream.

The Environment Committee will meet on 10-8-2018.

City Council Members in attendance:

• Dimple Ajmera, At-Large, Chair, Environment Committee
• Larken Egleston, District 1, Vice-Chair, Environment Committee
• Gregory A. Phipps, District 4, Member, Environment Committee
• Matt Newton, District 5, Member, Environment Committee
• Braxton Winston, At-Large, Member, Environment Committee
• Tariq Bokhari, District 6