calgary
Population: 1,500,000
Current emissions: 16.4 M tCO2e (2003)
Per capita emissions: 14.9 tCO2e/person (2003)
Reduction Target: 50% below 2005 levels (16.4M t) by 2050
A city once known for rampant urban sprawl and an economy largely tied to oil and gas, Calgary has put efforts in place to change its course, setting emissions reductions targets 50% below 1990 levels by 2036. In fact, its mayor, Naheed Nenshi, was recently awarded the 2014 World Mayor prize for his outstanding leadership, which has included continued efforts to advance the City’s sustainability efforts.
The imagineCalgary Plan for Long Range Sustainability was an initiative to create a shared vision and detailed plan for the city to move towards urban sustainability over the next 100 years, starting with the next 30. The plan included a rigorous engagement process, with contributions from 18,000 Calgarians. A series of 114 targets and their associated strategies were developed over a 2-year period. Targets are divided into 5 systems categories: built environment, economic, governance, natural environment, and social. Businesses, residents, community groups, public institutions and others then track their efforts, contributing to the Plan’s aggregated outcomes which are submitted into the Plan’s online platform. Some targets include: access to information and literacy on sustainability, increased support for local food production, increase locally based businesses, construction and retrofit of energy efficient buildings, reduction in private vehicle kilometers travelled by 20%.
Other successes seen since the implementation of the City’s 2004 Climate Action Plan include: an electricity services agreement with the City’s utility to have all city operations run on wind energy, leveraging the development of a new 80 MW wind farm in southern Alberta; initiation of a large scale biodiesel pilot project; full implementation of a City sustainable building policy; proposals put forward for the installation of a district energy plant; continuation of methane capture projects at the Sheppard and East Calgary landfills; methane capture, electricity and heat generation from the Bonnybrook wastewater treatment plant; and fleet greening initiatives. To maintain and track their corporate environmental activities, initiatives, and impacts, the City uses EnviroSystem, an ISO-14001 registered environmental management system.