More sustainable shores
We helped the city of Miami define a pathway to meet its carbon neutrality goal, promote and develop its green economy and solidify their Climate Action Plan (CAP).
Helping cities combat climate change with customized tools
An oceanside urban landscape, Miami is a city with breathtaking seaside views, which also make it extremely vulnerable to sea-level rise, flooding and major storm events brought about by climate change. As a C40 City, Miami is part of an urban network of 100 municipalities collaborating around the world to set and achieve ambitious greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction targets by 2050. To address existential threats from the climate crisis, the city of Miami collaborated with us to help define a pathway to meet its carbon neutrality goal, promote and develop its green economy and solidify their Climate Action Plan (CAP).
Analyzing greenhouse gas emissions
In 2019 Miami declared a climate emergency and committed to develop a GHG Reduction Plan that achieves carbon neutrality by 2050 with an interim goal for 2035. We collaborated with the city to evaluate Miami’s baseline GHG emissions and tested reduction strategies using the C40 Pathways scenario modeling tool.
The Pathways tool helped identify the impact of GHG mitigation strategies in each target year. We then used Pathways to develop three different future GHG scenarios: business as usual, existing and planned actions and ambitious action. Through this process, the city identified a preferred scenario for reaching their 2035 interim target and setting the city on a path toward carbon neutrality by 2050.
Developing opportunity scenarios
As part of the GHG reduction scenario evaluation process, we analyzed four options for interim target achievement focusing on different sectors of action opportunity: a purely renewable electricity option, a transportation and land use planning option, a building energy efficiency option, and a blended option with aspects all three.
The blended option was selected to best balance GHG reductions in each sector. From this option, we identified the key high-level reduction strategies in each sector and developed a draft set of policy-based city actions that corresponded to each strategy.
To holistically assess each GHG reduction action, we used the Action Selection and Prioritization (ASAP) tool, which we developed for the C40. The ASAP tool allowed us to perform a multi-criteria assessment of each draft action, evaluating the actions’ additional co-benefits and implementation feasibility, in addition to their GHG reduction potential. In collaboration with the city, we defined a sub-set of prioritized actions based on the evaluation results. We then facilitated internal working group sessions with city department staff and a public engagement process to refine and finalize the prioritized CAP actions.
Greening the economy
To understand the impact of the CAP on the local economy and to help Miami capitalize on green economic development opportunities, we analyzed the existing green economy and identified green or becoming-green industries that were primed for growth.
We found opportunities for both growth and GHG reduction could be encouraged through solar energy initiatives, electrification of vehicles and increasing micro-mobility options for residents such as bikeshare programs and sidewalk improvements.
We worked with the city and key green economy stakeholders to prioritize goals for not only growing the local green economy but also developing an equitable green workforce. As a tourist-based economy, measures such as helping restaurants and businesses reduce their waste stream by connecting establishments to resources that can assist in reducing single use plastic, integrate composting, and recover and redistribute surplus food was just one way, among others, to make the economy more sustainable. Cultivating an equitable and green workforce included initiatives to train city employees on emerging resilient and sustainable buildings initiatives and technologies including solar photo voltaic systems, energy storage, EV charging, energy efficiency, electrification, and climate adaption policies.
These goals were then assessed through literature reviews, economic and workforce data analysis and stakeholder interviews. Conclusions were ranked according to actions that provided specific community co-benefits, including positive benefits for climate justice, green infrastructure, and jobs creation. For example, providing additional policy and financial incentives to encourage private solar installations and identify incentives that would appeal to owners of affordable housing was one of several that ranked highly as a viable policy goal..
