CHARLOTTE — Across Charlotte, you may have seen more solar on city rooftops and more electric cars on the road. The rapid shift comes from a 2018 resolution city council passed unanimously to make Charlotte a leader in fighting climate change.
From there, Sarah Hazel, the chief sustainability and resiliency officer, said the city laid out the Strategic Energy Action Plan to find a way to make Charlotte a “low carbon city” by 2050, and have all city and fleet cars running on 100% clean energy by 2030.
“It’s trending in the right direction,” she said. “But there’s still a lot of work to do.”
With five years to go until that 2030 deadline, Hazel said the city’s made significant progress in expanding its electric fleet and converting all its buildings to clean power. The city now has more than 200 EVs in its fleet, more than 30 solar projects throughout the city and after a second power purchase agreement with Duke Energy to build a solar farm in South Davidson County, Hazel said the city will have enough green energy to be within 19% of that 2030 goal.
Meanwhile, meeting the fleet goal by 2030 is proving to be more difficult.
“Given we have vehicles that are big as fire trucks and solid waste vehicles and right now, the technology isn’t quite there,” she said.
Though the city is investing in electric busses and will be getting its first electric firetruck when the new Fire Station 30 opens, Hazel said its not feasible to expect a full-electric transition for most of their heavy-duty vehicles. Instead, she believes the city should set a new goal for full fleet of light-duty vehicles powered entirely by clean energy by 2035.
“The infrastructure that it takes to charge those [large] vehicles are more challenging than some of our smaller vehicles that, we have have more options and opportunities to purchase,” she said. “We are replacing our vehicles with the lowest emitting vehicle that can do the job.”
As for overall emissions, Hazel’s office completed an inventory on 2023 emissions which she presented to a council committee last week. The data shows per capita greenhouse gas emissions in Charlotte decreased by 30% since 2019 and while road transportation emissions remain the largest emitter in the city, the category has also seen one of the largest reductions.
Moving forward, Hazel said the city has been taking that assessment as well as resident feedback to develop an updated SEAP to present to council in March. The new plan, she believes will get Charlotte to those 2035 goals as well as a new city-wide net-zero by 2050 goal, while taking into account new priorities.
“For example, one thing is extreme heat, and so this updated Strategic Energy Action Plan will make that direct connection between things like the climate risk of heat and some of the other work, such as our tree our tree canopy action plan,” she said.
Hazel said the city is taking into account results from the recent UNC Charlotte heat mapping study and should be looking for ways to address those areas where the city’s heat island effect is the worst.
In the near-term however, Charlotte will face headwinds from a new federal administration that has deprioritized issues like environmental justice and climate mitigation. Many of the city’s investments thus far have relied on federal grants, incentives and tax credits, which are unlikely to continue under the Trump Administration.
Given those challenges, Councilmember Ed Driggs said the city needs to be clear-headed about what it could take financially to meet these climate goals without as much outside help.
“Is the city prepared to make investments by offering incentives for example, in order to help us achieve that goal? That’s the tough question,” he said.
To Hazel however, this is a commitment the city made six years ago, and while federal priorities come and go, Charlotte made a promise to follow through even if it means looking for help in nontraditional ways.
“Look for those public private partnerships, partnerships directly with the community and nonprofits that are doing incredible work,” she said. “And look at both the local context as the landscape changes.”
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