Forest City getting greener

London Free Predd Fri, July 18, 2008

By JENNIFER O'BRIEN

London may not be an environmental leader yet, but it's on the right path toward combating and coping with climate change, says a Nobel Prize-winning local scientist. "London is trying. It may not be a leader, but it is doing things," said Gordon McBean, who sits on the mayor's energy sustainability council. "There has been a fair amount of work done and people around the table are focusing on energy sustainability and reduction of greenhouse gas emissions." McBean's comments came in response to criticism from environmentalists who say the city's efforts toward reducing greenhouse gases are weak. This week, environmental advocates from the London chapter of the Council of Canadians claimed a tiny victory when council's planning committee agreed to recommend London consider a climate change strategy -- though the group was otherwise shut out of a public meeting on the future of drive-throughs here. But efforts have already been underway toward a strategy, agreed McBean and London's director of environmental programs, Jay Stanford. For the past five years, since the city produced a local air quality report, staffers have been tracking and reporting on London's energy use and recommending community- based programs that aim to decrease that use. Such programs include a city-wide carpool database and the one-tonne challenge, which challenged Londoners to try to reduce greenhouse gas production by a tonne each year. And as early as this spring, staff members plan to take data collected about London's energy use to council in a report that will provide a framework of small- and large-scale measures Londoners can take toward city-wide reduction goals. Reports indicate this city is seeing a stabilization of greenhouse gas emissions, said Stanford. "Now we've got to get to the reduction. "A small measure would be looking at what is our goal on idling," said Stanford, who pointed out idling only accounts for three per cent of the greenhouse gas emissions caused by traffic. "Larger measures could include taking a look at solar panels for houses, or geothermal heating, and (whether) some incentives (could) be offered through the city or businesses." But the Council of Canadians's Cory Morningstar said such initiatives are "watered down" and would have little impact on climate change. "That is a campaign for the public," she said. "We want a strategy that talks about how we operate as a city with targets and dates." The council wants strategies similar to those set by Toronto and Ottawa,which have goals for as far in the future as 2050. The council says London must reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by about five per cent a year until it reaches a targetted 90 per cent decrease. Instead, London's strategy will more likely be modelled in a "continuous improvement" framework that measures progress each year, Stanford said. McBean said London is acting "in a smart way" on tackling climate change. "Toronto and Ottawa are leaders in Canada, and London is now moving on a number of fronts," he said. McBean, a professor at the University of Western Ontario's departments of geography and political science, shared a Nobel Prize with about 1,000 other scientists around the world for work on climate change.