Published By: Communications and Public Outreach
Citizens' Advisory Committee
Power Subcommittee
MINUTES
SPECIAL MEETING
October 9, 2007
1155 Market Street, San Francisco
4th Floor Conference Room
5:30 - 7:30 p.m.
Members present: Kimia Mizany (Chair), Nick Carlin, Ken Cleaveland, Steve Lawrence,
Members not present: Aaron Israel, Winchell Hayward and David Pascal
Staff: Jim Chien
Members of the Public: Pamela Davis
ORDER OF BUSINESS
Roll Call
Present: Mizany, Carlin, Lawrence, Cleaveland,
Absent: Pascal, Israel, Hayward
- Call to Order
Kimia Mizany, Chair, called the meeting to order at 5:40 p.m..
- Approval of Minutes
Minutes from September 11, 2007 meeting approved with one addition word “municipality” added to item # 6, paragraph 5, line 1 before utility bills.
- Announcements
Kimia announced that David Pascal has resigned. Ken Cleaveland said he will be resigning soon.
- Public Comment
No public comment.
- Presentations and Discussion: Melissa Capria, who is the Climate Action Coordinator for the SF Environment, and Danielle Dowers of SF PUC Power Enterprise, who oversees this joint project with SF Environment, gave a presentation on the San Francisco Climate Action Plan.
Melissa opened by pointing out that in recent years the occurrence of natural disaster has increased from once every hundred years to once every ten years. For example, El Nino, that caused millions of dollars in damages, occurs more frequently. By the end of the century, California’s sea level will rise 12 inches because of global warming, according to a very conservative California government report, and that does not include the melting of the land-and sea-based glaciers.
Ms. Capria went on to talk about the framework and baseline of the SF Climate Action plan. She said the majority of greenhouse gas emissions in the San Francisco Bay Area are from transportation and building energy consumption.
To address these problems, San Francisco established the Climate Action Plan and became the first US city to obtain the emission data certification in 2005.
The San Francisco Climate Action plan includes Transportation, Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy and Solid Waste Actions that can combine to reduce 2,614,000 tons of greenhouse gas emission per year. San Francisco’s LEED Silver Standard, Green Taxi services are all part of the action items. For example if every household in SF switched 5 incandescent bulbs to CFLs, we could reduce CO2 by more than 50,000 tons per year. If one-third of SF households got rid of an old refrigerator and bought a new energy star fridge, we could reduce CO2 by more than 50,000 tons per year.
When asked about the difference between Climate Change and Global Warming, Ms. Capria explained it’s just how different political parties call it; basically they are the same thing.
- Meeting adjourned at 7:40 PM.
