Cities and Climate Change: Strategic Options for Philanthropic Support

The next stage of city-based climate mitigation policies should include work outside the city.

That’s the conclusion of Cities and Climate Change: Strategic Options for Philanthropic Support, a new report issued today by Boston University’s Institute for Sustainable Energy (ISE).

Read Report: “Cities and Climate Change”

The report, authored by an ISE team with internationally-recognized urban climate expert John Cleveland, urges urban climate policy planners and the funding community to engage more strongly in metropolitan regional planning and policy efforts, and also to engage more in state-level policy-making.

Of course, in-city mitigation strategies remain critical, and the report urges cities to continue these efforts, especially work on thermal and transportation decarbonization.

“This report is very useful for increasing the impact that cities can have on our national progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” said John Cleveland, report co-author and Executive Director, Boston Green Ribbon Commission. “It demonstrates that in addition to reducing their own emissions, cities can play a lead role in advancing deep decarbonization action at the scale of metropolitan regions and at the state level.”

“The ISE report lays out a compelling opportunity for climate mitigation—the regionalization of climate networks,” said Katharine Lusk, Executive Director, Boston University’s Initiative on Cities. “It prioritizes promising areas of investment for funders—strategically and geographically—to effect change at scale.”

The report is authored by Jennifer Hatch, John Cleveland, Michael Silano, and Peter Fox-Penner.