Connecting land use and global warming

California takes the lead 1

California is once again taking the lead:

California Attorney General Jerry Brown has sued San Bernardino County, the largest in area in the contiguous USA and one of the fastest growing, for failing to account for greenhouse gases when updating its 25-year blueprint for growth. "It's groundbreaking. California is just leading the way for other states and jurisdictions that will ultimately follow," says Richard Frank of the Center for Environmental Law and Policy at the University of California, Berkeley.

...

If the suit is successful, California cities and counties could be forced to take steps to limit sprawl, promote compact development, require builders to design energy-efficient houses that offer solar power, and encourage less driving, more mass transit and use of alternative fuels.

Time to put land use at the center of our national conversation.

(h/t: WSJ)

David Roberts is staff writer for Grist. You can follow his Twitter feed at twitter.com/drgrist.

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  1. pecan tower Posted 6:09 am
    06 Jun 2007

    leading? not really, more like 30 years behind...oregon has had state level land use planning since the mid-1970's with the goal of keeping cities compact (through urban growth boundaries) to save farmland and forest land.  the goal may not have been to reduce global warming emissions, originally, but it has evolved towards that, especially since the early '90s. public transit was added to the equation in the early 80s.

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