'Still Plenty To Do': Local Governments Push Climate Goals Amid Federal Rollbacks
At odds with a federal government that is unsupportive of climate resilience initiatives, state and local officials in Massachusetts are doubling down on their climate goals and emissions reporting.
Climate leaders who spoke at Bisnow's Boston Sustainability and Energy Conference said they are looking for new ways to finance and develop climate-friendly projects through updated regulations, creative financing mechanisms and community support.
Panelists said they must move forward on their goals even if the federal government won't.
"At this moment in Boston, we don't have the luxury to ignore the science, to ignore the reality on the ground," Boston Chief Climate Officer Brian Swett said at The Westin Boston Seaport District hotel Tuesday morning.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration canceled more than $7.5B in Biden-era grants to support hundreds of clean energy projects, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Massachusetts had been slated for approximately $466M in grants for more than two dozen projects across the state.
The climate goals in Greater Boston are among the most ambitious across the country. Boston is requiring all buildings to hit net-zero emissions by 2050. Cambridge requires nonresidential buildings of 100K SF or more to reduce emissions by 2026 and be net-zero by 2035.
Swett said that climate action has been led, historically, at the city and state levels. That changed when the Biden administration began funding thousands of climate-related projects across the country, he said.
The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 included many tax incentives for sustainable development of green buildings. In 2023, the Biden administration also awarded up to $7B to several communities in an attempt to jump-start hydrogen power usage.
"The Biden administration obviously flipped the switch," Swett said. "It was almost overwhelming at times."
Swett said the city’s climate agenda needs to move forward amid the political headwinds. Even as these federal grants are being pulled, Swett said he is determined to keep projects on track and prepare for when national priorities swing back in their favor.
"We will continue to operate locally with state partners," Swett said. "When the pendulum flips back eventually, we'll be ready to take advantage of federal resources."
Julie Wormser, chief climate officer for the city of Cambridge, said policy windows open and close all the time. It is on state and city officials to be proactive and work through an unfavorable administration's policies to get the work done, she said.
City governments have several avenues to pursue to streamline climate change projects. These include creating regulatory markets and government procurement for climate technologies and streamlining the siting process for energy projects, Wormser said.
"Whether we can fully move forward on them or not, we can be just as busy now," Wormser said. "What will stop us more than the federal government is a loss of hope and momentum, because there's still plenty to do."
As cities push forward, developers are hoping future planning and action can be more streamlined across the board.
Massachusetts cities have various goals for sustainability initiatives, making it confusing for owners that operate in multiple places, Davis Cos. Senior Vice President of Construction Gretchen McGill said.
The Davis Cos. operates in Cambridge, Boston and Watertown. Each city either has or has proposed different sustainability guidelines and goals.
Watertown city officials proposed their own set of regulations to reach net-zero emissions, but the town hit pause on the ordinance after objections from the business community.
"As we go forward, it would be really helpful if we could have a consolidated state consensus on how we're going to do this," McGill said. "There are some big-picture things that we would really like some clarity on.”
The state only requires owners to report energy use data for buildings of 20K SF or more, starting this year. The requirement only covers roughly 30,000 buildings statewide.
Although the state doesn't yet have set guidelines for owners to reduce emissions, that could change. Mandates and potential emission limits could soon be implemented statewide, AHA Consulting Engineers Director of Energy and Sustainability Katie Raymond said.
"When we have our conversations with our owners, who are not necessarily just from Boston and Cambridge but also statewide, we're … thinking about what's coming in the very near future," Raymond said.
