Accelerating Local Action on Climate Disruption
Many of you know that I have a long and wonderful relationship with the Institute for Sustainable Communities (ISC) working together with them on civil society projects around the world. Over the past couple of years their work on climate issues has really grown and I thought you might be interested in some of those projects, too.
ISC's Climate Leadership Academy serves the urgent and rapidly growing need for more support to cities and communities that are working to increase energy efficiency, create green jobs, reduce climate pollution, and strengthen their resilience to the local impacts of climate disruption. The Academy helps local climate and energy practitioners do their jobs better by connecting them to their peers in other cities and to leading national experts, providing easier access to the best available information and approaches, and facilitating dialogue and collaboration with their regional, state and federal counterparts.
Building on nearly 20 years of experience, ISC is:
- Organizing intensive two or three day workshops on effective local climate action led by experienced practitioners from leading cities and national experts in community-based climate solutions;
- Developing resource guides and case studies that compile and synthesize the best available information—tools, studies, and practices—on topics ranging from building energy retrofitting to climate-friendly transportation to climate adaptation; and
- Coordinating a virtual peer-learning and networking program that connects workshop participants as they face new challenges and apply lessons learned.
The Academy builds the capacity of communities to use American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) monies and other funding sources to take smarter, swifter, more effective action to increase energy efficiency, reduce their dependency on fossil fuels, and strengthen their communities and economies.
The topics for the academies have so far focused on: Building Energy Retrofits, Transportation Efficiency, Green Job Creation, China: Low Carbon City Development (video), and Climate Adaptation and Resilience.
You can download the excellent resource guides that have been created for each of the academies by clicking the links above.
