Assembly Bill 32 (AB 32, 2006) mandates a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. All we have to do to fix the problem is to determine emissions goals for cars and light-duty trucks and give the automaker their marching orders, right? Well, no. There’s a much better solution.
If we continue to assume that people will keep driving cars, and that the population is expected to increase, the carmakers alone are not going to be able to solve the problem.

What about changing the existing assumptions? What if people didn’t have to drive as far? What if a lot more people used public transportation? Could thinking like that, combined with lower emissions from the biggest polluters, enable us to reduce greenhouse gasses (ghg’s) in spite of an increase in population?

Enter Senate Bill 375 (SB 375, 2008), which requires a reduction of ghg’s to 1990 levels from new land development or redevelopment projects. It also called for the creation of a technical advisory committee to advise the California Air Resource Board (CARB) on how to reach the 2020 goal.

So where does this committee come from? Who has the knowledge to make such a comprehensive ten-year plan? Twenty-one professionals have volunteered their time and talents to make this happen. For the most part, they fall into two groups: organizations who want their cities and counties to thrive and organizations whose goal is to reduce emissions. While these goals may seem to be at odds, the job of the Regional Targets Advisory Committee (RTAC) is to make a plan to do both at the same time.

Who are the representatives of California residents and businesses? Ten committee members are involved in local government and city planning, five are involved in public transportation, five are from organizations that support environmental issues, and one from a California new home builder. They come from all of the major metropolitan areas as well as universities and state-wide organizations.
The committee must submit its report to the California Air Resources Board at the end of September. In the next two months, they will put together recommendations of actions and measurements that will enable each region to meet the required goals, taking into consideration the capabilities of each entity and current and projected economic factors. No small feat.

When they’re done, they’ll have accomplished something that could not have been done without a huge long-term commitment from a wide variety of organizations. This is the only kind of effort that can possibly make a significant dent in greenhouse gasses in California.

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