By Cyrus Reed
It’s been an eventful few months. Not only are we in the third-month of a nationwide partial lock-down due to COVID-19, but we are also now in the third week of justified protests across the nation against systemic racist oppression and police brutality toward Black people, including protests right here in Texas. With these important events taking place, you might have missed some news in the continued efforts to deal with yet another, but definitely related, crisis: the climate crisis. For the first time in their history, our two largest cities, Houston and Dallas, both unveiled and partially approved Climate Action Plans. And the question is: are these plans hopeful signs of progress or are they just not good enough? I think the answer might be both.
First, a little background. City-wide climate action plans are relatively new attempts for cities to deal with their own contribution to climate change through electricity use, gas use, transportation, and land use development- while also using programs and policies to adapt to the changing climate. In Texas, a number of cities have already adopted initial plans and begun implementation projects, including Austin and more recently, San Antonio.
Last year, both the City of Dallas and the City of Houston and their newly elected mayors (Eric Johnson in Dallas and Sylvester Turner in Houston) announced they would begin crafting Climate Action Plans. The aim of these plans is to help the cities meet the goals of the Paris Accord on Climate and center city operations on a more sustainable path. Houston and Dallas’ respective city departments, (Dallas’ Office of Sustainability Houston’s Mayor’s Office) began the initial public processes. Dallas in particular made a wide effort to include stakeholders and bring in diverse voices into their proposed plan by forming stakeholder groups and hosting multiple public meetings.
Earlier this spring, drafts were released, comments were submitted, and more finalized plans were released again.
On April 22nd, the City of Houston officially released its Climate Action Plan. Not to be outdone, Texas’ second largest city, Dallas, also released its finalized plan, officially called the Comprehensive Environmental and Climate Action Plan.
Many organizations and residents felt the Dallas plan was too weak to be effective.
While several organizations supported the plan as a good but not perfect first step, other organizations such as Texas Campaign for the Environment, Sunrise Dallas and Southern Sector Rising felt the plan made too many compromises. These organizations point out that the plan fails to explore the forming of a public utility or a goal to completely electrify buildings thus moving away from fracked gas, reneging on zero waste goals and failing to address specific cases of environmental racism. Instead, they called for a People’s Climate Action Plan with much stronger goals and processes. They were particularly concerned about the influence of large corporate interests like oil and gas, utilities and developers in the outlines of the plan.
Still, in Dallas, the CECAP is official policy, with the City Council unanimously adopting the plan on May 27th, despite some opposition from local citizens and organizations. Both Sierra Club and Public Citizen publicly supported the plan despite its shortcomings.
What’s in the Dallas plan?
The Dallas CECAP is divided into eight different sections where the City of Dallas would begin to plan for future goals and programs. While we don’t have the space to outline all of these goals and programs here, it is worth mentioning the significant commitments to ensure that future construction is more energy efficient.
The plan includes several goals including: get to a net zero energy new construction code by 2030, commit to more programs that encourage local solar energy, commit to electric fleets and publicly available EV chargers, reduce waste going to landfills, encourage urban canopies and reduce air pollution.
These goals are positive, although most climate advocates would agree that the timelines don’t come soon enough and they could be strengthened. As an example, while a goal to get to net zero energy new construction is a good one, waiting until 2030 would be disastrous. Instead, Dallas should immediately begin work on a new construction code so that buildings built in 2021 will use approximately 15% less energy and water by adopting the 2021 International Energy Conservation Code, which was approved nationally by building code officials earlier this year.
The Dallas CECAP includes goals in:
- Net Zero Energy new construction
- Energy use in existing residential buildings
- Solar power installed
- Renewable electricity plans
- Publicly available EV chargers
- Electric fleets
- Single occupant vehicle travel mode shift
- Organic waste
- Paper waste
- Landfill diversion
- Water consumption
- Water for indirect reuse
- Impared waterbodies listed in watershed
- GHG emmissions from treatment facilities
- Canopy cover citywide
- Urban Heat Island Index
- Park or trail access
- Health, affordable food access
- Acres of urban gardens
- Restaurants, farms stands, or markets sourcing from local producers
- Ground level ozone
- Air pollutants
What about Houston’s plan?
The draft Houston CAP has similar provisions, although it is divided into four areas: Transportation, Energy Transition, Building Optimization, and Materials Management. A useful guide is their “implementation” plan which can be found in their “spreadsheet” which lists the four sections, 12 major goals and more than 80 individual programs or actions to get there. There are many worthy goals and programs related to encouraging renewable energy, energy efficiency, electrification of transportation, and better management of materials and wastes. But again, like the Dallas plan, many of the proposed changes are on a slow time-scale. For example, the plan mentions updating their building construction and energy codes by 2025, even though building officials in the United States adopted the International Code Council in 2021. If adopted by Dallas, the 2021 ICC codes would reduce water, energy, and gas use substantially today, and waiting until 2025 would be a step backwards.
So has the Sierra Club taken a position on these plans?
We have, and it’s nuanced. Basically, we are telling Houston and Dallas officials that the CAPs are a hopeful sign, but they are not good enough. Working with our volunteer local groups in Houston and Dallas, our position is that both the Houston and Dallas plan are good first steps, but need to be strengthened as we move forward.
In Dallas, we submitted a letter supporting the plan as a good first step, but then worked with our local group and Council member Omar Narvaez on a resolution that accompanied the CECAP to assure that the plan can be strengthened moving forward. Under the terms of the resolution, the City Manager will soon name an Environment and Sustainability Advisory Committee to help carry out the plan and within 18 months, a more permanent Commission to make sure the plan is fully implemented. In addition, the plan will be reviewed every three years and can be strengthened by Council action. A copy of that resolution can be found here. We recognize and appreciate Councilmember Narvaez’ willingness to strengthen his resolution, while also recognizing that many members of Dallas’s community --including some of our allies like Texas Campaign for the Environment -- still did not support the plan as presented.
In Houston, we submitted comprehensive comments with the Houston group calling for substantial improvements to the timelines and goals contained in the plan. In addition, both the Houston group and the Lone Star Chapter signed a letter along with 26 other organizations in Houston calling for the plan to be considered by the full City Council later this year, and to commit to four additional changes once approved by City Council:
Metrics for standardized implementation. One of the keys to successful climate planning is the incorporation of clearly defined targets with timelines for monitoring and reporting. The current plan does not list out key performance indicators, but states that the working groups will help to define the indicators. We recommend a more frequent reporting schedule of every other year rather than every five years with opportunities for community input on the updated reporting.
Updates. Once the initial plan is adopted, the Office of Sustainability should bring forward an updated Plan every three years, with recommendations for modifications or additions to the Plan, with robust opportunity for public participation and input.
An Equity Scorecard that evaluates its effects on communities most affected by a legacy of environmental injustices. Other climate action plans have used equity scorecards and strive for a meaningful relationship with communities on the frontlines of the climate crisis. Climate action plans across the country have used equity scorecards to jointly define success with community, ensure outcomes of programs and policies are achieved and that implementation actions deliver on the promise to prioritize the most impacted communities. An example that can be customized to Houston context comes from the Environmental Health Coalition (EHC) (score card p 42). A second example comes from the California Climate Justice Working Group (CJWG) in partnership with the Greenlining Institute. These partners developed recommendations to uphold equity and environmental justice in the California climate plan with monitoring and metrics to evaluate impact on the ground. Groups collaborated to publish a report with recommendations to develop a public accountability system to track equity outcomes. It specifically notes that “the state should develop an annual Climate Equity Report based on tracking equity outcomes to enable state officials to monitor whether equity goals have been reached, to identify areas where climate policy should be improved to advance equity, and to hold public bodies accountable for progress.” Municipalities that take this step send a strong message that they are serious about realizing the vision of climate justice.
The Office of Sustainability, in coordination with the mayor and city council, should also appoint a Community-Led Climate Advisory Committee to oversee the implementation of the recommendations put forth in the Climate Action Plan. In addition to reconvening the working groups, the community-led climate advisory committee will support the city’s implementation efforts and ensure equity remains a focal point of the plan. The city should include diverse membership that includes representation from community groups particularly from Complete Communities as well as from nonprofit groups. We would also like the city as part of its commitment to equity to provide training in equity in climate action for the advisory committee and working group members. Additionally, this taskforce can connect to the work of the Drainage Taskforce, the emerging Environmental Justice Working Group, and other relevant committees so that there can be a comprehensive and cohesive approach to these issues.
At this point, it is unclear when the Houston CAP will be presented to the full city council for final adoption, but we will continue to work to pressure the Mayor’s office to strengthen the plan and include some of the community demands moving forward.
While we are hopeful that our two largest cities admit that climate change needs to be acted upon at the local level, the plans are not strong enough as is to deal with the crisis in a way that is sufficiently ambitious and equitable to all Dallas and Houston residents.