Title
Resolution Adopting the Living A2Zero Ann Arbor Carbon Neutrality Plan
Memorandum
On November 4th, 2019, Ann Arbor City Council unanimously voted to declare a climate emergency and set the goal of becoming carbon neutral, as an entire community, by the year 2030. In that same resolution, Council directed staff to create a living plan for how to achieve carbon neutrality by 2030, and present that draft plan to City Council no later than March 31st, 2020.
On March 30th, 2020, Ann Arbor City Council unanimously voted to receive the A2Zero Ann Arbor Carbon Neutrality Plan and directed staff to create a funding / investment plan and a prioritization framework and to bring these documents, along with the Plan, back to Council for re-consideration. Staff created those documents (attached) as well as a Governance Framework (attached) to help identify how the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan will be revised and updated. As such, staff are now bringing the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan back to City Council for formal reconsideration.
As background, to create the Plan, staff undertook an intensive 4-month public engagement process that included more than 60 public events, 3 public surveys, 2 large town halls, the recruitment and engagement of over 60 partner organizations, support from over 80 technical advisors, the hiring of a communications firm, and the engagement of technical consultants to supplement staff in the quantification of the cost and greenhouse gas reduction potential of climate-related actions. In total, this initiative led to the creation of the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan.
The Plan includes 7 overarching strategies and potential 44 sub-actions. The 7 overarching strategies are the heart of the plan and include:
1. Powering our electrical grid with 100% renewable energy.
2. Switching our appliances and vehicles from gasoline, diesel, propane, and natural gas to electric.
3. Significantly improving the energy efficiency in our homes, businesses, schools, places of worship, recreational sites, and government facilities.
4. Reducing the miles we travel in our vehicles by at least 50%.
5. Changing the way we use, reuse, and dispose of materials.
6. Enhancing the resilience of our people and our place.
7. Other - which are mostly foundational initiatives that support the work above as well as the purchasing of carbon offsets to close any remaining gap between emissions reductions locally and emissions produced locally.
The A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan was always envisioned as being a living plan, one that will change and evolve over time. As such, the actions included in this plan are those that can be initiated immediately to continue on our path towards carbon neutrality. As new ideas emerge, the proposed Governance Framework and Prioritization Framework can help evaluate those actions for potential inclusion in the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan.
In addition to the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan, we are enclosing an Investment Plan (excel and word), which provides more details about the cost of action as well as the cost of inaction. In particular, the Investment Plan outlines how most of the strategies are truly investments, meaning they will have returns that outweigh the upfront cost. The Investment Plan also highlights the costs of inaction by using the social cost of carbon. Within the investment plan an effort was made to outline upfront costs, the costs of inaction, and where the Plan returns investments so that the Plan can be looked at more holistically.
Finally, the Plan was designed to be living. This means that the Plan, and the individual actions, will be revisited regularly to gauge their overall success (see the Governance Plan). More specifically, it is highly likely that these actions will continually be revised, enhanced, revisited, or removed from consideration, based on new technologies, new funding opportunities, changes in political or social contexts, or other variables. The Plan was designed to be flexible to these changes, making it a living plan that serves as a directional roadmap for Ann Arbor’s carbon neutrality work.
Budget/Fiscal Impact: See the attached Investment / Funding Plan.
Staff
Prepared by: Missy Stults, Sustainability and Innovations Manager
Approved by: Tom Crawford, Interim City Administrator
Body
Whereas, On November 4, 2019, Ann Arbor City Council unanimously declared a climate emergency and set a goal of becoming carbon neutral, as an entire community, by the year 2030;
Whereas, The Office of Sustainability and Innovations heeded this charge and created the A2Zero initiative to organize the planning and implementation work related to the City’s carbon neutrality goals;
Whereas, Public engagement was integral to the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Planning work, with over 60 public events held over 4-months, most with individuals not traditionally engaged in City planning processes;
Whereas, Over 80 individuals joined four technical advisory committees to help identify what was technically needed to achieve carbon neutrality by the year 2030;
Whereas, Three public surveys were administered which, in addition to the more than 60 public events, provided insights into what was socially possible in regards to achieving carbon neutrality locally;
Whereas, Over 60 partner organization supported the A2Zero planning process and have agreed to be partners in supporting implementation of various actions identified in the A2Zero plan;
Whereas, The A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan was designed to be a living plan that can be changed as things such as technology shift;
Whereas, The A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan also includes a Governance Plan, Prioritization Framework, and Living Funding Plan, all of which will be revisited on a 2-to-3-year basis;
Whereas, The societal and economic costs of not acting to mitigate and adapt to climate change far exceed timely investments in emission reduction measures; and
Whereas, As with all projects requiring significant city investment, relevant components of the Plan would come before City Council for ultimate authorization;
RESOLVED, That Ann Arbor City Council adopts the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan; and
RESOLVED, The Ann Arbor City Council requests that the City Administrator begin or continue work to implement the actions outlined in the Plan; and
RESOLVED, The Ann Arbor City Council requests that the City Administrator schedule a special working session of Council in fall 2020 to review the Plan and implementation activities.
AMENDMENT TO CLARIFY THE A2ZERO CARBON NEUTRALITY PLAN, STRATEGY 4.5 INCREASE THE DIVERSITY OF HOUSING
Whereas, The clarity of the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan can be improved with minor edits without changing the goals or outcomes of the Plan;
Whereas, The edits clarify the relationship between the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan and the Master Planning Process without any changes in their relationship moving forward;
Whereas, The edits remove language that some community members find inflammatory; and
Whereas, The edits make the language on page 78 consistent with the Timeline and Initial Actions chart at the bottom of the page.
RESOLVED, That the A2Zero Carbon Neutrality Plan, pages 78 and 79 is edited as follows:
Section 4.5, page 78
INCREASE THE DIVERSITY OF HOUSING [ALLOWED BY RIGHT]
This action focuses on[ allowing more housing, up to four units residential buildings and Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) by right, in all areas of the city] SUPPORTING POLICIES TO INCREASE HOUSING OPPORTUNITIES WITHIN THE CITY.
Vision for Increasing the Diversity of Housing [Allowed by Right]
Equity Impacts
Allowing, [by right,] multi-units [up to quadplexes] and promoting…
Section 4.5 continued, page 79
By 2030, the Increase of Housing [Allowed by Right] strategy will…
INCREASE THE DIVERSITY OF HOUSING [ALLOWED BY RIGHT]
*[Brackets] indicate deleted language. ALLCAPS indicate new language.
As Amended and Approved by Ann Arbor City Council on June 1, 2020