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Urgent Call for Climate Leadership: Strengthening Flagstaff’s Commitment to Carbon Neutrality
Short Description:
In this letter to the Flagstaff City Council, Dr. Stefan Sommer—retired NAU professor and board member of the Northern Arizona Climate Change Alliance—urges the City to accelerate its net-zero emissions goal and revise the Regional Plan 2045 to reflect stronger, clearer climate action language. He calls for measurable milestones, code revisions, and bold leadership to ensure Flagstaff meets its 2030 carbon neutrality commitment amid escalating climate threats.
Dear Flagstaff City Council,
PREAMBLE: As y’all know I am with the Northern Arizona Climate Change Alliance and a retired NAU professor. I read the scientific literature on climate change. Climate change is now accelerating even as climate disasters hit us daily. Climate change raises our food prices, raises our insurance costs, undermines our housing market, and creates greater risk of wildfire and flooding. We have now heated the oceans to a depth of 2,000 m with over 350 Zetajoules (1021 joules) of heat energy. The recent leap in global sea surface temperatures in 2023 and 2024 suggest that the oceans may be reaching their limit on buffering Earth’s surface temperatures. This means that the City’s goal of net zero emissions by 2030 is not soon enough, and I encourage you to implement that goal much more rapidly than you have been able to since that goal was unanimously ratified by the City Council in 2018.
The argument that Flagstaff is small on the global scale is irrelevant. Emissions are additive and every bit we emit worsens the climate crisis.
COMMENTS on THE REGIONAL PLAN: Our current Regional Plan sets the goal of Flagstaff emissions being net zero by 2030 and that statement is followed directly by the statement that new development proposals need to help the City meet that goal. While the net zero goal is still stated in two places in the most recent draft of the Regional Plan 2045, the second statement is not, and it needs to be brought back in as clearly as it is stated in the current Plan. The Net Zero goal needs to be more strongly stated in every chapter of the Plan.
The current draft of the plan is not clearly written and contains contradictory statements that relate to the Net Zero goal. These need to be corrected to clearly state that the Net Zero by 2030 goal is central to everything that the City does. The following statements in the Carbon Neutrality section of the Plan are internally contradictory and need to be reworked. If you want any hope of attaining the Net Zero by 2030 goal, then the statement in red below needs to be removed.
p. 2-4
Other Strategic Plans: The City and County may have other policy documents and strategic plans such as the Carbon Neutrality Plan, Ten-Year Housing Plan, the Active Transportation Master Plan, and the Utilities Master Plan. These plans inform City programs and work planning but cannot be used in making findings of conformance with the Regional Plan
p. 3-18
As stated in the Carbon Neutrality Plan, the City of Flagstaff has a goal to be carbon neutral by 2030 through greenhouse gas emissions reductions and balancing any remaining emissions with carbon dioxide removal
Goal CA.a – Achieve and maintain carbon neutrality for the City by reducing emissions from all sectors (City only).
p. 7-8
Use the City’s 2022 Carbon Neutrality Plan or later adopted versions as the guidelines for implementation (City only).
IMPLEMENTATION: The 3rd statement above is good and Austin Aslan assures me that all city divisions/departments now submit their own carbon footprints when they submit their annual budget requests. That is very good, but how do you move forward with implementation of the Net Zero goal? Since the Net Zero goal was first ratified in 2018, the City has gotten less than 10% of the way there and it is now 2025, more than halfway to 2030. To successfully reach the Net Zero goal by 2030, the City needs to set milestones. A simple milestone calculation would suggest that every year since 2018 the City should have reduced its carbon footprint by one 12th which would be 8.3%. By that simple calculation, the City should already be over 55% of the way to Net Zero.
Since that hasn’t happened, it suggests that the City Council needs to provide leadership on this. Set milestones based on current reported carbon footprints of each division/department so that they do not have to make catastrophic changes in 2029.
Can we see some leadership on this from City Council? This would need to start with this draft of the new Regional Plan. Then it would also require changes to City Code that would allow implementation of the changes needed for each division/department to reach milestones.
Someone needs to lead this process. Can we please see some leadership on this from City Council? Please start that process with your revisions to this new Regional Plan and then provide the same leadership on the City Code analysis.
Best Wishes!
Dr. Stefan Sommer
Director of Education (retired), NAU Merriam-Powell Center for Environmental Research
Board of Directors, Northern Arizona Climate Change Alliance www.NAZCCA.org
Editor/Author, Spotlight on Climate, monthly column for the AZ Daily Sun https://azdailysun.com/search/?nsa=eedition&app=editorial&d1=&d2=&s=start_time&sd=desc&l=25&t=article&q=%22Spotlight+on+Climate%22&d1=&d2=&utm_source=newsvu&utm_medium=qrcode&utm_campaign=DOK, https://www.nazcca.org/spotlight-on-climate
Executive Producer, Spotlight on Climate Radio Show, KSZN 101.5 FM www.RadioSunnyside.org, https://www.nazcca.org/spotlight-radio
Executive Producer, A River Reborn: the Restoration of Fossil Creek
Executive Producer, Treasuring Our Natural Heritage, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPWo553Kk2lcohmCQ9fV3SwjMUVNLnzqT
WE CAN’T DO IT WITHOUT YOUR SUPPORT!
Please make a year-end gift to NAZCCA. It’s easy, fast, and tax deductible. Go to https://www.nazcca.org/donate to donate. Consider a monthly donation to have even more impact. And while you’re on the website, check out our Climate Pledge and volunteer opportunities!
Thank you for supporting NAZCCA.
NAZCCA urges us all in N. Arizona to step up:
Review please the climate action teams (CAT) and sign up for a CAT, or suggest a CAT you want to help build. For example, the STEP (Sedona Tools Empowering People) welcomes volunteers to a local CAT.
Please make a tax-deductible donation or earmark a donation to support one of our dedicated efforts.
Please consider volunteering even if uncertain. Visit NAZCCA.org, then sign up here. We will connect with you quickly.
At a minimum, ask your friends, neighbors, and even strangers to sign the NAZCCA petition online or download a paper copy!
Thank you for all you do. You make a difference.