Green A City

Water on the brain: 4th Annual CA Climate Change Conference

By Ken Ott, Research Associate, SustainLane
Sustainability research, Government Division

I rode Amtrak to the 4th Annual California Climate Change Conference in the state capitol on Tuesday, September 11th. By doing so, I enjoyed nice views of the San Francisco Bay and farmland in between the two cities. I also read more about the event before arriving.

This was my first California Climate Change Conference and it was a nice refresher course, in addition to a source for reams of new information which I still haven't finished reading. The California Energy Commission and California Resources Agency put on this conference and are the state's primary policy and planning agencies for energy and natural resources, respectively.

* * *

I'd like to share what I learned at the morning session on water in this post. Instead of merely reading about climate change issues, in contrast, it was great to speak with panelists and other attendees in person. Although magazines or online articles can be important resources, there is no substitute for conversation and one-to-one dialogue.

The morning panels focused on probable climate change impacts such as: water (flood risk and mitigation) and air quality (soot effects on snow melt rates). I was able to listen to and speak with a great number of people who are experts in their fields.

Some of them included Michael Dettinger, Scripps Institution of Oceanography who works on observing increased flood vulnerability, and Sam Earson, Desert Research Institute, who studies groundwater supply issues, using gas tracers. All of the panelists do good work and contribute to a greater  understanding of climate change issues as they affect the Western US as well as the global community. All of them are supported by state agencies or deparments and in turn report back to these bodies.

Below are synopses of most speakers' presentations with their respective conclusions as well as mine. If you are already knowledgeable in general you can skip my commentary and just read the indented text boxes. These contain much of my verbatim notes. You can also attend the sessions virtually. Sessions are archived in PDF and streaming audio/video for your convenience: Conference Home.

* * *

CLIMATE CHANGE AND WATER RESOURCES IN CALIFORNIA
Session Chair: Jamie Anderson (California Department of Water Resources)

The early morning sessions were well attended and very clear in assigning further certainty to likely extreme weather events in the future. The main culprit in all cases was a human induced warmer biosphere. 

“California Flood Risks in a Changing Climate”
Michael Dettinger of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography presented a model in which a global climate +3 degrees Celsius warmer leads to “flood friendly” conditions in California and along the entire West Coast. These conditions include increased winter snow melting and a stronger phenomenon of “Atmospheric Rivers.”

West coast more likely to get more rain
More rain than snow
Double area of rain --> double flooding
Additional winter melting: much wetter soils in northwest, slightly drier soils in CA --> but doesn't reduce flood risk
"atmospheric rivers" -- the storms to worry about. warm pacific storms.
"pineapple express" -- source of big storms/floods
More flood risk: rain rather than snow; wet snows & soils; more large storms; need to have better flood management through increase observation of snow, weather patterns...

Michael Dettinger gives his presentation. Click for larger photo.

Jerry Brown to California Cities: Curb Greenhouse Gases or I'll Sue You

California Attorney General Jerry Brown gave members of the California League of Cities convention yesterday in the state capital the threat of lawsuits if the state's 400+ cities don’t account for the greenhouse-gas producing activities related to their planning processes.

The former California governor and mayor of Oakland earlier this year in his new role as self-proclaimed "top cop," sued one hyper-growth California county for not calculating the impact of its extensive development plans on greenhouse gas production.

Brown used the state's groundbreaking 2006 AB 32 global warming mitigation legislation as precedent in a now-settled lawsuit against San Bernardino County. His office is compelling the county to inventory its total greenhouse gas emissions and to come up with a greenhouse gas reduction action plan for reducing emissions tied to new development, through a long-existing regulation known as the California Environmental Quality Act.

"We've got to adopt feasible measures to reduce greenhouse gasses through public processes--every city and county in California can do it," Brown told the gathering of hundreds of mayors and city managers. "I want to join with you to help. If you don't, I'll sue you. You have your roadmap, your threat, and the carrot of good things you'll achieve and bad things you'll avoid, so let's do it!"

The “bad things” he referred to that could be avoided included more smog and forest fires because of higher temperatures and broken levees because of increased flooding risks attributed to global climate change.

Brown, in his gruff San Francisco "Out-the-Mission" accent (which to this native Chicagoan always sounds more Chi-Town than anything), lauded Republican Gov. Schwarzenegger and the state's General Assembly for its far-reaching global climate change emission reduction targets.

"What California has done in adopting AB 32 is more comprehensive than the greenhouse gas reduction goals in any state and in some ways is more complete than anything accomplished by any nation."

Brown alluded to the California Environmental Quality Act being signed back in 1970 by then Governor Ronald Reagan and how last year Gov. Schwarzenegger signed AB 32 into law.

"A Republican signed the most far-reaching, invasive measure to make your life more difficult and now I'm the top cop to chase down people who emit greenhouse gasses," the long-time Democrat said, with a hint of irony.

The crowd of city officials, representing every political stripe, guffawed and cheered the former-seminary-student-turned career politician.

Rocky Mountain Institute Turns 25: or The Distributed Generation of Amory Lovins' Brainpower

We repost Warren's August 15th article from WorldChanging this week. -Editor

One of the world's leading energy and environment think (and do) tanks celebrated its 25^th anniversary in characteristic style this past week. With numerous references to the looming risks of global climate change, peak oil and energy disruption, combined with developing nation social-political and national security challenges, the event took on the air of urgent practicality.

 

Besides the Rocky Mountain Institute'€™s stellar staff and its fearless founder/leader, Amory Lovins, the Aspen-based event attracted a jaw-dropping line-up. On stage were former President Bill Clinton, past CIA director R. James Woolsey, former New York Governor George Pataki, Sustainable South Bronx'€™s Majora Carter, Wal-Mart Chairman Rob Walton, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, technology luminary Bill Joy, Patagonia Founder Yvon Chouinard, and British Sky Broadcasting CEO James Murdoch.

 

Off stage things were no less dull, with a brain-pummeling cast of physicists, business leaders, authors and technologists mixing it up in perpetual reminiscing, scheming and celebrating. "€œYou can bet I will be so on your ass,"€ said a longtime corporate dematerialization expert to a clean tech incubation strategist he had just met, after they plotted how the United States can capture various sectors of global innovation markets.

 

What was extraordinary at the two-day session of panels and parties was how much RMI'€™s iconic founder has altered the consciousness of those present. It was as if little bits of his brain were implanted into the words, plans and outlook of those at the dias and congregating in the beaux arts hallways of the venerable Hotel Jerome.

 

Lovins has developed many world-changing concepts over his 35-year career including "negawatts"--€”reducing the need to produce energy through conservation--and its economic cousin, "the soft path."€ An Oxford-educated physicist, Lovins uses hard data as the basis for making the world'€™s economy radically more energy efficient through better planning, design and day-to-day use in both buildings and industry. More recently RMI has presented ideas on leapfrogging comatose American automotive innovation with superlight materials and hyper-efficient engine and drive train functionality.

"The demand side of energy efficiency is not as sexy as solar or wind energy, but it is much more effective,"€ said Joy. Working with venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers, Joy is working on "€œlooking for something in green technology advances to make a factor-twenty change on a long-term basis."€

Bike Capital of the World?

We repost Warren's June 14th article from WorldChanging this week. -Editor

The Future of Carbon-Free Transport: Groningen, Netherlands

The future of carbon-free transport lives strong in Groningen. This Dutch city of 185,000 proves that bicycle transportation can reign supreme: people there make about 150,000 trips by bicycle every day.

Bicycles and pedestrians entirely rule the medieval-era city hub, cruising along on car-free dedicated pathways and short cuts with no traffic signals in some instances. But people also commute on bikes in large numbers from suburban housing spread out around the city to downtown jobs, via a ring-and-spoke network of paths. Overall, 37 percent of area commutes are made on bikes.

Boasting an official town bicycle planner, Groningen has created an infrastructure it refers to "continuous and integral," which includes massive surface and underground bicycle parking facilities, dedicated bike paths, and two-way bike lanes even on one-way auto streets.

Since the early 1980s, 30 city bicycle parking facilities have been developed, including one underground facility at the central train station that sells bikes, repairs bikes and offers valet and secure parking for more than 4,000 bikes. Parking is financed through a low-cost annual membership program that costs $50 a year, while bike valet positions create significant numbers of jobs at the public parking facilities and also at 15 local schools.

Bike parking and paths, however, are only the physical manifestation of the careful cycling cultural nourishment that has been provided by city leaders collaborating with citizens. In 1986 Groningen developed what is believed to be Europe’s first dedicated bike policy document, which focused on a broad spectrum of bike transportation and awareness programs. Educational programs now include teaching the health and economic benefits of cycling.

"We think we can boost the numbers of cyclists even higher," said bicycle planner Cor van der Klaauw on Josh Hart’s Car Free Blog. "We have programs to introduce new immigrants to cycling. Many of them came from places where the car is the ultimate status symbol. We need to show them that in Holland, they can get around very easily by bicycle, status symbols aside."

Groningen's bicycle planning has not occurred in a vacuum, but rather complements an integrated scheme that includes low-priced parking facilities for cars, strong public transport and careful public transit linkages between car parking areas and centers for employment and education. With these amenities, cars use, especially in the city center, was successfully restricted without impacting local business.

Other so-called northern European "cycling cities" may be more known (Amsterdam; Copenhagen, Denmark; and Ghent, Belgium) but none can match Groningen for its complete vision and high rate of daily velocipedic participation.

The Netherlands averages a 26 percent national cycling rate, Denmark scores just under 20 percent and Germany achieves about 10 percent, according to a report published by Dutch research group Fietsberaad (Number 7).

While bicycles in the US currently comprise only 0.4 percent of all commuter trips, some North American cities are actively promoting bicycle transportation--through planning dedicated mapped routes and facilities--as a way of reducing global climate change-causing carbon emissions. San Francisco, for instance, has announced a goal of having bicycle trips make up 10 percent of all city trips by 2010.

What’s behind the high rates in Europe, besides the history of bicycle use and culture? According to Fietsbaraad: "Accepting the cyclist as a 'normal' traffic participant with equal rights in the '50s and '60s has been a crucial factor; (so has) the realization of a motor car infrastructure (that) is not at the expense of the cyclist….”

Warren Karlenzig is Chief Strategy Officer at SustainLane, where he directs the company’s US city rankings, and SustainLane Government, an open-source best practices sustainability knowledgebase for state and local government officials and their constituents. Warren is lead author of the newly released How Green Is Your City? The SustainLane U.S. City Rankings (New Society Publishers). His blog is www.greenacity.com

Intergov Climate Change Report

The full story is out today from the latest release of the fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and it aint pretty.

Seems the 2,500 international scientists that have been putting this report together for the past three years, were subject during the wee hours of the morning last night to supposed intimidation from government representatives from China, Saudi Arabia and Russia.

China's is the world's other big carbon pollution producer besides the United States, and Saudi Arabia and Russia have future economies tied almost exclusively to fossil fuel production. The charge of the scientists is that these representatives from these nations tried to water down the findings.

Besides stating "with high confidence" that human-caused global climate change is having significant effects on various aquatic and terrestrial global life forms, along with impacting human settlements and individuals, the policymaker summary report offered details such as:

• "The resilience of many ecosystems this century is likely to be exceeded by an unprecedented combination of climate change (and) associated disturbances (such as wildfires, floods, insects, heat waves, etc.)"
• "Coasts are exposed to increasing risks....the most vulnerable industries, settlements and societies are generally those in coastal and river flood plains..."  Take note New York, mid-Atlantic states, California, Hawaii, Florida and the Southeast.
• Warming in Western (North American) mountains is expected to cause decreased snowpack, more winter flooding and reduced summer flows, exacerbating competition for over-allocated water resources." This speaks most urgently to the Northwest, British Columbia, California, and the Southwest, much of which depend on year-round water supplies from melted snowpack.
• "Cities that currently experience heat waves are expected to be further challenged by an increased number, intensity and duration of heat waves during the course of this century with potential for adverse health impacts. The growing population of elderly is most at risk." Remember last summer's record heat wave in LA and the San Francisco area with some all time highs near 120 degrees? Or what about Chicago's 1995 epic heat wave that killed anywhere from 485 to 700 or more, many of them elderly? We must be better prepared for such future incidents through everything from building design and urban planning to energy management and crisis planning.
• "Adaptation will be necessary to address impacts resulting from the warming which is already unavoidable due to past emissions."

It's not all gloom and doom. The summary goes into solutions:

• "Sustainable development can reduce vulnerability to climate change by enhancing adaptive capacity and increasing resilience." Green building, renewable energy, energy efficiency, waste reduction, transit-oriented development, water conservation and increased local food supplies all come to mind.
• "Many impacts can be avoided, reduced or delayed by mitigation."
• "One way of increasing adaptive capacity is introducing consideration of climate change in development planning,  for example, including measures in land-use planning and infrastructure design."

Okay, try to have a great weekend now!

 

Before the Flood? Economic Risks and How to Prepare

Ocean levels have been consistently rising in the United States, so maybe people should reconsider buying that beachfront second home, right?

 

It turns out the rising ocean levels have many more implications on the US economy, particularly in regions such as California, according to eye-opening new studies cited in a series in The Contra Costa (California) Times.

Studies show ocean levels have risen seven inches off the California's Golden Gate in the past century, after rising about two inches per century since the last ice age. With melting glaciers and ice caps throughout the world, the rate of sea-level rise is accelerating in the upper range of what has been previously predicted.

 

California has been mapping since the fall how these rising sea levels, which are likely to accelerate even more with continued global warming, will impact everything from the state's water supply to its transportation infrastructure. It turns out that if the upper limit of ocean levels is reached as projected by the end of this century, portions of cities and virtually the major Bay Area airports in San Francisco and Oakland would be under water.

Storms, which contribute powerful tidal surges, would only make matters worse. Currently California faces less damage to coastal flooding than do states along the Atlantic and Gulf Coast, markets where insurers have been pulling out of because of heavy recent hurricane-induced flood losses over the past years.

Policy to address global climate change, such as California's historic carbon emission-reducing AB 32, is a smart way to begin to mitigate major potential risks to the US economy from rising sea levels. California's coast and low-lying areas include much of the state's most valuable real estate along with its most valuable financial and high-tech industry centers.

Even the Pentagon is concerned about the implications that global warming-induced flooding may have for our national security. In fact, it was a Department of Defense-commissioned study in early 2004 conducted by the Global Business Network  that helped to convince California state officials of the very real economic and security threat that global climate change represented.

So the Pentagon and the state with the largest population and economy are projecting global climate change-induced scenarios that may change our lives dramatically over the coming decades.

Should we take global climate change seriously, or do we continue to do business as usual until our ability to do business will be abruptly halted, as it was with Hurricane Katrina?

Top Ten Green Cities: Review of "The Climate Code" Episode on SustainLane's US City Rankings

The Weather Channel's "The Climate Code" covered in-depth The SustainLane US City Rankings yesterday, featuring reports from the top ten cities out of the largest 50 US cities SustainLane ranked in 2006. Look for How Green is Your City? The SustainLane US City Rankings from New Society Press in April with expanded and updated information on the rankings.

Yesterday (rebroadcast Saturday, January 27 at 3, 5 and 11 p.m. Eastern), we heard about the following cities:

1. Portland, Oregon

Portland provides a great example of what cities, citizens and businesses can do together to improve their quality of life along with the local economy.

Once having some of the nation's poorest air quality, Portland now has some of the best air and tap water quality nationwide, along with free public transit downtown, the highest bike-to-work rate, the most LEED-certified buildings, strong local food and an emerging alternative fuels economy. Plus the real estate community has backed the first residential home multiple-listing service with green features in history.

2. San Francisco

San Francisco is a close competitor with Portland for managing sustainability programs that help provide the nation's best solid waste diversion rate (recycling and commercial composting), and feature bold projects for solar and tidal energy generation. San Francisco's housing affordability remains an issue that forces many to commute long distances into the city. Fortunately the Bay Area features strong public transportation to help make that commuting less polluting and congested.

3. Seattle

Mayor Greg Nickels, who appeared on "The Climate Code," is a strong national advocate for climate change policy, clean technologies, green building and effective sustainability policy management. Seattle, its port authority and King County, have been teaming up on biodiesel ferry and bus initiatives, while the city has strongly pushed for restoring native forests in the Emerald City.

4. Chicago

My hometown, and each time I visit, I'm more wowed by what I see under Mayor Daley's leadership. Mayor Daley, who spoke on "The Climate Code" about wanting to go from #4 in the SustainLane rankings to #1, has been greening streets, freeways and even abandoned industrial sites.

Chicago blends the aesthetic with the technical aspects of sustainability: the world's largest green roof at Millennium Park underlies a Frank Gehry-designed bandshell, all part of an ongoing study to reduce urban heat-island effect.

5. Oakland, California

Oakland is a great "sleeper" in the top ten, with growing public transit use, policy supporting more local food, renewable energy and a move toward energy security. New Mayor Ron Dellums is instituting a "green collar" jobs program for youth and low-income workers, so that the clean tech jobs the city is trying to lure can equally benefit professionals, skilled people in the trades, unskilled workers and students.

6. New York City

With the country's best urban public transit system, New York is not resting on its laurels. Mayor Bloomberg is putting his weight behind city appointments, committees and processes that are making a sustainability plan a reality in 2007. Out of such activities, look for the city to assume a leadership role in developing alternative fueled vehicles, renewable energy (including tidal) and Gotham-scaled green buildings.

7. Boston

The Bean goes Green. Boston is poised to become the leading city for green building with its new zoning requiring that all buildings over 50,000 sq. feet be LEED (the US Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certified. Add that to high renewable energy use, great public transit, walkability and low sprawl, and you get a promising future. Weakness: recycling. 

8. Philadelphia

Philly's #8 has been a surprise to some, but the city is a great model for local urban food, with strong networks of farmers markets and community gardens. The city also is riding a wave of interest in sustainability from citizen groups, business (including the local Business Alliance for Local Living Economies), and just plain folks who have been attending large planning and visioning meetings.  From that process the city needs a sustainability plan that city officials buy into, along with more recycling and renewable energy.

9. Denver

When cities claim that they can't build public transit like that of such "older cities" in the top ten, I always point to Denver. The city and 30 surrounding towns in 2004 passed a ballot measure to build out more than 100 miles of new light rail and other new public transit lines.

Mayor Hickenlooper has made sustainability the foundation for the city's future, through economic development that will be integrated with the new public transit. The skinny: 4x current public transit ridership in 15 years and a vital new American city.

10. Minneapolis

Minneapolis wants to increase its energy and food security, as Mayor R.T. Rybak described on "The Climate Code" yesterday. The city will continue being the leader in renewable energy for Midwestern cities, while bolstering farmers markets and community gardens (it's already #1 in that area), and green building. 

Miami and Virgina Beach Flooding from Ernesto?

According to today's NOAA's 5-day prediction, Miami and the Virginia coast, including the cities of Virgina Beach and Norfolk, will be deluged with up to 10 inches of rain this week as a result of Tropical Storm Ernesto.

Miami is particularly susceptible to flooding, especially the South Miami area, which is expected to be lashed hardest by Ernesto's rains tonight and tomorrow. Check out Michael Grunwald's new book The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise to get an idea of how vulnerable South Florida  is with all its development not only to hurricanes and tropical storm wind damage but also to such torrents that regularly cycle through the region.

Miami ranked as the most vulnerable city for catastrophic natural disasters out of the largest 50 U.S. cities in a ranking developed earlier this year by SustainLane. Tomorrow we shall see how it will fare in the wake of Ernesto's rains. 

Hotter Than Ever: Negative Feedback Loop?

This week's East Coast heat wave, which broke the record again today for energy demand in the New York grid and across the central and eastern part of the nation, comes as the superheated Gulf prepares for another hurricane next week. Fortunately, through proactive conservation measures,New York and other big cities have so far escaped the 100-degree event without a major catastrophe.

The Gulf is far less likely to be spared from damage from tropical storms such as Chris, whether it is the oil and gas infrastructure that gets hit (I'd put major damage at 50 percent-plus likelihood this season), or major cities such as New Orleans or Houston. Miami, ranked as the number one most vulnerable city to natural disaster by SustainLane, could also get impacted if Chris takes a more northerly course, in which case New Orleans and Houston would still be at risk. Any combination would translate into higher prices for oil, gasoline and natural gas. Record demand for electricity for air conditioners is also boosting natural gas and electricity costs.

Our current events so readily illustrate that energy is becoming our nation's main global climate change issue not only in how our consumption contributes to global climate change, but also its distribution, use and pricing is affected by this change.

On  a related note, former President Clinton announced yesterday that five US cities (LA, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco and New York) will be joining 17 other major world cities, who are banding together to reduce their carbon emissions in what is being called the Clinton Climate Initiative. The cities will be also sharing technology and best practices in areas like alternative fuel development and city planning in order to reduce carbon emissions and mitigate global climate change impacts.

In a novel turn of events, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced Monday a knowledge-sharing pact to combat global climate change. The two government heads said they would work with major companies to develop a carbon cap-and-trading system. Attendees at the LA-area announcement included the co-founder of Google, Rupert Murdoch's son James Murdoch, and Richard Branson. Some speculated Blair was looking to secure an afterlife in business, or a "Lord on the Board" position, as my British expat friend Chris Dean quipped.

Schwarzenegger, who is running for re-election in November, asserted in a watershed speech last year in San Francisco that  I attended (6/1/05): "...the debate is over. We know the science, we see the threat, and we know the time for action is now."

Not a moment too soon. Now time to put some flesh on the bones before they get bleached in the sun.

Hotter than Ever: What Next?

California's state-wide heat wave, now going for 12 days, has so far claimed an estimated 90 lives (more than 140 as of 7/30/06). New all-time highs and night-time minimum temperatures have been set across the state. The massive system has become a weather phenomenon never before witnessed by state officials, drawing humidity from monsoonal Southwest moisture and splayed out over thousands of square miles, billowing up to 30,000 feet in the atmosphere.

Besides the human deaths, the heat has had a significant effect on livestock and poultry, with milk production reduced by 15 percent, while killing 25,000 cattle and 700,000 fowl over the past two weeks. Crops are not ripening properly and are being burned on the vine and branch. California is the nation's leading dairy and fruit producing state. Stone fruit, tomatoes and grapes are thought to be most at risk--it is no exaggeration that California's agriculture industry feeds the nation during summer and fall months.

The state's power grid has used more power than ever before by a significant amount on multiple days of this 12-day run. Monday's all-time record was within a few percentage points of the state's total grid capacity. Blackouts did occur, some cutting air conditioning in regions with high temperatures approaching 120 degrees during the day and the mid 80s during the night. More than 800,000 lost power in Northern California, leaving homes and businesses without air conditioning in 110-115 degree conditions. If demand increased only slightly on Monday, large-scale blackouts would have occurred. These would have not only surpassed the Enron-induced rolling blackouts of 2000-2001, they would have resulted in hundreds if not thousands of more deaths.

Reading today's news of dozens of bodies being discovered is a harsh indicator that the health care system  needs a way to better handle and prepare for such heat waves.

Let's suppose this unprecedented heat wave--at least during the last 150 years or so of record keeping--is the result of global climate change and that these events will become more frequent and more intense in the near future.

Besides reversing global climate change through carbon reduction, how can we best deal with what may be already set in motion?

• Greater energy efficiency has to be a given. Less energy consumption for buildings, for manufacturing, for cities. How do we do that? Weatherize homes and businesses, more than ever before. Put in florescent light bulbs, and design structures with extreme weather in mind. This will save residents and businesses money over the medium term while helping businesses make money as new energy efficiency products and services are developed by public-private partnerships.
• Use green building approaches such as dayligthing, which lights homes with no electric or energy use. Solar and wind energy can be produced by homes or utilities during peak demand periods to supplement gas, coal or nuclear power plant energy production. Super insulation and advanced design approaches utilizing passive cooling will also be critical.
• Plant trees and green rooftops. These actions are no longer the luxuries of schoolchildren or green zealots. Trees planted on the east and west exposures of buildings can lower temperatures up to 10 degrees indoors. Street trees can lower ambient temperatures for cities, while making pedestrian passage easier, requiring less heat-generating parking lots. Green rooftops can also significantly reduce indoor temperatures while potentially mitigating the urban heat island effect, as Chicago has tried to do with 2.5-million square feet of rooftop gardens.
• Increased water conservation must occur in regions where water is imported long distances. Importing water consumes tremendous amounts of energy because of the pumping required--it's the greatest single use of energy in California. More climate-appropriate landscaping is needed, water conservation and reuse (greywater) should be facilitated through building codes and permitting in any way possible.

Besides taking these potential amortized-cost (green building), low-cost (energy efficiency, trees) or no-cost measures (water conservation, daylighting), cities and regions need to start modeling such threats and benefits (if any) of global warming and other likely climate-change scenarios.

Yes, agriculture may move northward in the U.S. and Canada as average mean temperatures climb, but ag also needs to be adapted to suit conditions such as long-lasting 100-degree heat waves in regions that normally don't experience such temperatures. Citrus and pomegranates might still be okay for California, for instance. But other vulnerable crops may need to be grown further north, like in Oregon's Willamette Valley or British Columbia's Fraser River Valley.    

Cities, metro areas and regions can run simulations assessing how climate can impact overall energy availability, consumption, and overall metabolism. With rising energy costs and threats to power grid dependability, this is a critical exercise in economic and disaster preparedness.

And if global warming or climate change is not occurring, a theory that becomes less feasible every year, this series of actions still makes more sense than ever because of rapidly escalating energy costs.