CRed - The Community Carbon Reduction Project at UNC-Chapel Hill

Reducing carbon dioxide emissions will be an immensely difficult task for three reasons:

• We live in a society that is highly dependent on, one might almost say addicted to, the burning of fossil fuels as the basis for energy provision and economic growth. Weaning us from this dependency will be a formidable challenge.
• Activities leading to this burning are under the control of a wide range of features of our society, from individuals, to institutions to communities to governments. This requires solutions focused on each of these levels of social organization.
• Since so many levels of society will be involved, there is a need for innovative policy approaches based on a complex portfolio of approaches, from voluntary measures, to market mechanisms to regulation.

Even the task of keeping track of emissions, of doing the “book-keeping" on current emissions and the effects of policies on their reduction, will be difficult. Where should we place the responsibility for calculating emissions and designing policies? You might imagine any number of levels of organizing the problem:

• We might focus on each individual, making them- as our colleagues at Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute have recommended- into Carbon Managers. Each individual then examines his or her life- their uses of energy in transportation, home heating, etc.- and makes a pledge to reduce the emissions from their lives by 60%.
• We might focus on energy sectors- transportation, commercial, residential and industrial- that ultimately drive carbon dioxide emissions. Each sector would be responsible for a proportionate reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.
• We might focus on institutions- Progress Energy, Duke Power, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Each institution would then make a pledge to carbon dioxide reductions in those activities under their control.
• We might focus on communities or municipalities such as the Town of Chapel Hill or the City of Cambridge, having their town staff, town councils, business groups, etc., commit to and track the needed reductions.
• We might focus on state-level governments, such as the State of North Carolina, the U.S. federal government, or the government of England. The state or nation as a whole would be responsible for the needed reductions, allocated as they wish across the various sources.
• Finally, we might focus on the global scale, perhaps through an organization such as the United Nations, which contains the United Nations Environmental Programme. A prime example of such an approach is the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Interventions may be made at any of these levels, and it is likely that the task will require coordinated action across these levels. For example, while individuals ultimately decide whether to walk or drive, community planners and developers are responsible for how far they must drive to obtain essential services (such as food), auto manufacturers are responsible for the gas mileage of their cars, and the policies of the federal government (such as investments in renewable energy technologies) affect the choices available to individuals and companies. It is for this reason that a suite or portfolio of approaches will be needed, from public education, to market-mechanisms (e.g. carbon taxes), to tax credits, to community design, to regulatory control (mandatory gas mileage targets).