Climate change solutions can start here in Ottawa

City should lead the way on lowering emissions, Tobi Nussbaum writes .

The conclusions in this week’s report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are stark: The world needs to de-carbonize by 2050 or risk catastrophic impacts. Yet, greenhouse gas emissions remain on an upward trajectory. The critical work of reducing and eventually eliminating carbon as a source of energy will require sustained political will and public demand for action. But as much as the climate crisis is a global problem, solutions need to begin in our towns and cities.

In particular, our municipalities have the ability to lead the transformation with two of the major sources of carbon pollution: transportation and buildings (heating, cooling and powering).

Reducing our transportation emissions means providing residents with efficient, reliable and secure low- or no-carbon options to move around the city. Investing in public transit is key — not just in the light rail transit system but also by ensuring buses are reliable, efficient and not stuck in regular traffic, through the widescale deployment of transit priority measures. We need to also look at how we finance public transit; our tax dollars currently subsidize the construction and maintenance of roads to a much greater extent than we subsidize transit. Transit riders in Ottawa pay the highest cash fare in Canada, which is why I fought (unfortunately unsuccessfully) to freeze fares during LRT construction. We also need to ensure residents have safe options to move around by foot or two wheels on wide sidewalks and bike lanes, adequately cleared in winter.

Cities around the world are also finding innovative ways to encourage residents to make their homes and businesses more energy-efficient. Through the use of municipally administered loans paid back through the property bill at a rate no higher than the energy cost savings, cities can incentivize reduced energy use of heating and cooling our buildings.

The city can also partner with Ottawa Hydro to retrofit all of its municipally owned buildings — something that can be done on a cost neutral basis. The only barrier to this initiative is bureaucratic resistance and lack of political action — something I plan to tackle in the next term of council.

It’s time for city hall to end its timidity and embrace a much more ambitious approach to combating climate change. As the nation’s capital, Ottawa has every reason to demonstrate national and international leadership in greening cities. The IPCC report has given us a tough but achievable challenge and an opportunity we cannot afford to miss.