Digital News Report – The City of Santa Cruz released the updated final draft of their Climate Action Plan today. To celebrate the completion they had a tree planting ceremony in front of City Hall at noon.
Santa Cruz’s plan outlines how the city will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. They will accomplish these goals by using upgrading equipment to energy efficient products, conserving resources and energy, and by generating electricity using renewable resources.
The city will begin a Solar Santa Cruz Program that will expand residential solar system installations over the next 8 years. The city’s goal is to have 500 – 1000 solar system residential installations by 2012 and increase this number to 5,000 installations by 2020.
The city will formalize a City Energy Management Office that will be tasked with reducing the municipal building’s energy consumption by 40 percent.
The city will partner with UCSC on 25 research projects that will investigate sustainability and alternative energy.
The Climate Action Plan will have to be reviewed by the Santa Cruz City Council members during a January workshop. Then they will have a final hearing an approval for the plan scheduled for February or March.
The City has made the plan available to read on their cityofsantcruz.com website.
By: Greg Cook