U.S. Cities Release New Climate Action Playbook

Today at the 2019 C40 World Mayors Summit, nine U.S. Mayors joined UN Special Envoy for Climate Action Mike Bloomberg to release this new strategic guide to accelerate and deepen climate action in cities: the American Cities Climate Challenge Climate Action Playbook.

The Playbook is a blueprint for the world’s largest cities to reduce emissions from their building and transportation sectors— the two largest contributors to urban carbon pollution. The impact of the Playbook is clear: if the 100 largest U.S. cities adopted the outlined strategies, their total combined emissions would drop by 28.5%— meeting their share of the U.S. national target of reducing emissions by 26-28% by 2025, our goal set under the Paris Climate Agreement. This would result in carbon reductions of 224 million metric tons—  the equivalent of taking 47.5 million cars off the road for a year, or shutting down 57 coal fired power plants for one year.

In addition to addressing the climate crisis, these policies will also help cities create cleaner, safer, and more equitable communities. They’ll contribute to our nation’s transition Beyond Carbon— by focusing on eliminating building emissions, and replacing oil-burning cars and trucks with electric vehicles, these policies seek to make high impacts in two of the highest polluting sectors. And they’ll show the nation, and the world, what is possible when local leaders step up with bold climate action.

Learn more about how cities are driving our climate progress toward our Paris Agreement goals.