Frederick approves climate action plan for operations
Sep. 20—Frederick will begin planning for how to deal with the impacts of climate change on the city's operations after the aldermen approved a resolution to put a climate action plan into place.
The city's aldermen on Thursday unanimously backed the resolution, though aldermen Ben MacShane and Donna Kuzemchak absent.
The plan sets up specific actions the city will take in future years, Jenny Willoughby, the city's sustainability manager, told the mayor and aldermen.
Members of the city's staff are already working on implementing action items to be included in the next budget, she said.
The plan's final draft includes a greenhouse gas inventory to set a baseline and projects future emissions through 2030.
It also includes high-level resiliency planning to help city departments respond to the impacts of climate change.
The city passed a climate emergency resolution in April 2020 that recognized the importance of addressing climate change at the local level.
In 2016, the city developed a sustainability plan to establish a more holistic approach to reducing emissions and adapt to climate change. The steps included an environmental purchasing policy, an infrastructure plan for plug-in electric vehicle charging and an electric vehicle readiness policy.
Purchased electricity was the largest source of emissions for the city, according to the report, producing 8,920 metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2015. Transportation was the second-largest source, and waste — whether emissions from solid waste from city operations, solid waste hauled by the city or wastewater treatment — was the third.
The climate action plan includes government operations such as city buildings and facilities, streetlights and traffic signals, water and wastewater treatment plants, city fleet vehicles and non-fleet vehicles such as lawn mowers and construction equipment.
The strategies include completing the city's transition to LED streetlights, retrofitting city facilities with energy-efficient upgrades, installing renewable energy options such as solar power at city facilities, purchasing renewable energy credits, electrifying the city fleet, adopting a hybrid replacement program and expanding telecommuting opportunities.
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