Category Archives: 2017

Back-to-Basics with Recycling and the City’s Business Recycling Ordinance

Check out a recent blog post from Salt Lake City’s Economic Development Department on the Business Recycling Ordinance!

And if you’re a business or multi-family property in Salt Lake City that has questions about the ordinance or starting a recycling program, mark your calendar for two upcoming workshops:

October 26

When: Thursday, October 26, 2017, 2:30 – 3:30 p.m.

Where: Salt Lake City Main Library, Room A (Level 1). See list of room locations here.

What: Salt Lake City Waste & Recycling staff will present the details of complying with the ordinance and answer any questions you may have.

November 30

When: Thursday, November 30, 2017, 2:30 – 3:30 p.m.

Where: Salt Lake City Main Library, Room A (Level 1). See list of room locations here.

What: Salt Lake City Waste & Recycling staff will present the details of complying with the ordinance and answer any questions you may have.

SLCgreen’s Tyler Poulson talks #UtahClimateWeek and Clean Energy with HEAL Utah

Parowan Solar Tour (Scatec) - Aug 5, 2015

SLCgreen staff member Tyler Poulson on a tour of a large solar farm in Parowan, Utah, 2015.

Check out Tyler Poulson, Salt Lake City’s sustainability program manager, on the HEAL Utah podcast! He chats with HEAL’s Matt Pacenza about several key climate and energy issues including Utah Climate Week, coming up October 8-14. Tyler also offers his take on the recent rooftop solar settlement reached between Rocky Mountain Power and other stakeholders.

For more information about all of the interesting activities occurring during Utah Climate Week, visit the website of the Utah Climate Action Network.

Announcing Utah Climate Week– October 8-14!

We’re excited to announce Utah’s first Climate Week, with events from Ogden to Orem and here in the capital city!

Organized by the Utah Climate Action Network, Utah Clean Energy, and Salt Lake City, Climate Week will provide an inspiring opportunity for community members to learn of the risks and breakthrough solutions to climate change.

Click here for a full list of events, and take note of an interesting panel we’ll be part of on October 12: Utah’s Clean Energy Future.

Mayor Biskupski will offer opening remarks on our Climate Positive goals and SLCgreen team member Tyler Poulson will participate on the panel discussing what cities in Utah are doing to transition to clean energy. Other panelists include HEAL Utah, the Sierra Club, and Rocky Mountain Power. Utah Clean Energy will moderate the discussion.

What: Utah’s Clean Energy Future

When: Thursday, October 12, 6:00-7:30 p.m.

Where: Salt Lake City Main Library Auditorium (210 E 400 S)

Learn more in the press release below.
Continue reading →

Cider Pressing Day

This week, SLCgreen FruitShare partner The Green Urban Lunch Box and Mountain West Hard Cider are inviting volunteers to help press locally harvested apples into the second edition of The Green Urban Lunch Box Hard Cider.

The collaboration between the local non-profit and local business began last year and was a natural solution to the problem of what to do with fruit that’s not high enough quality for eating or donating, but is perfect for juice. What a creative way to minimize food waste!

Harvesting about 9,000 pounds of fruit from 50 various locations across the Salt Lake Valley and even a bit beyond, The Green Urban Lunch Box pressed approximately 350 gallons of juice in 2016. A crew of six staff members and two faithful volunteers spent two 12-hour days pressing apples, while almost 400 volunteers put in more than 1,500 hours to pick fruit that contributed to this juice.
Continue reading →

Help SLC Win a $150K Grant to Revitalize the Utah Pickle Company Building

We need your vote! Help Salt Lake City win a grant to restore a historic building, ensuring the sustainability and preservation of a great space in our community.

Salt Lake City is one of just 25 cities selected nationwide to compete, and is calling on its residents, business owners, patrons, and visitors to get behind the effort. The City has the chance to receive up to $150,000 in grant funding for the restoration of the historic Utah Pickle Company building. Built in 1894, this former pickle warehouse is located at 741 South 400 West in Salt Lake City’s Granary District, which recently received Utah’s first neighborhood business district Main Street America designation.

Restoring the Utah Pickle Company building will provide the Granary District with much-needed event space, a media production studio, flex office spaces for local artists and entrepreneurs, and a community garden!

Want to help Salt Lake City win?

1. Go to http://www.nationalgeographic.com/voteyourmainstreet

2. Make an account

3. Vote for SLC (up to 5 votes per person, per day!)

4. Login and vote each day until Oct. 31^st

Top: Mayor Biskupski speaks at the opening of the Liberty Wells Community Garden in 2016. A new community garden is just one of the proposed additions to the Utah Pickle Company building. Bottom: The Utah Pickle Company building in 1936 and today.

Continue reading →

Be Prepared for Climate Emergencies, Joint Op-Ed from SLC’s Sustainability & Emergency Management Directors

With all of the storms, hurricanes, and wildfires hitting our country this fall, we need to take the opportunity of September being Emergency Preparedness Month to prepare for and mitigate climate change.

Read the op-ed published in The Salt Lake Tribune from Salt Lake City’s directors of Sustainability and Emergency Preparedness.

By Vicki Bennett and Cory Lyman

September is Emergency Preparedness Month.

While Utahns traditionally take important measures to prepare for sudden natural disasters such as earthquakes, we also need to think about taking mitigating action for climate-related events such as extreme flooding, changing water supplies, wildfire and heat waves.

This need is amplified by the awful pictures we see of Hurricane Harvey and Irma and the destruction they have wrought. In Texas alone initial estimates are putting the damage at over $180 billion – that is billion, with a “b” – and we can’t start to comprehend numbers like that.

Scientists have been warning us for years that a warming climate increases the strength of storms like these — larger, powerful and devastating to our communities.

One month before Harvey hit, Salt Lake City experienced our own 200-year storm. .

CONTINUE ON THE TRIBUNE’S SITE.

“Leave your Leaves!” This Fall, try mulching your leaves at home

In the fall, when autumn brings a chill to the air, and Salt Lake’s oaks and elms and other deciduous trees drop their leaves, many of us turn on the blowers, haul out the rakes, and get ready for some serious work.

But—have you considered an alternative? Using some or all of your leaves to mulch your yard or garden? Continue reading →

Riverfest 2017 is Right Around the Corner!

Saturday, September 23, 2017 3:00pm 7:00pm

Fairpark Trailead: 1220 W North Temple, Salt Lake City, UT

The Get into the River Festival is a month-long series of community events centered on the Jordan River and Jordan River Parkway.

This Saturday, September 23, the Festival brings together the community, businesses and local governments to celebrate, restore, explore and recreate on the Jordan River corridor.

Continue reading →

“Live Electric” EV & E-Bike Discounts Through Sept. 30

Do you hate bad air days? We do too. Luckily, there are more and more options for cleaner transportation in Salt Lake City from Ride With Hive to the Live Electric EV & E-Bike discount program, a deal worth looking into if you have ever considered purchasing an electric vehicle.

Continue reading →

Mayor Biskupski Announces New Solar Installations Completed on Seven Government Facilities

September 14, 2017: Mayor Biskupski announces the completion of rooftop solar installations on seven city buildings, totaling 756 panels and 320,000 kW/year.

On Thursday at Fire Station 10, Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski, Fire Chief Karl Lieb and Tyler Poulson from the Sustainability Department discussed the City’s recent investment in solar power on seven separate municipal facilities, including five fire stations.

This latest round of installations doubles the total number of Salt Lake City municipal sites with solar energy to 14 separate facilities. When combined with the City’s recent enrollment in the Rocky Mountain Power Subscriber Solar Program, the total amount of renewable energy projects equals roughly 12 percent of annual electricity needs for City government facilities.

The locations receiving solar installations thus far in 2017 include Fire Station 1, Fire Station 4, Fire Station 7, Fire Station 10, Fire Station 13, Regional Athletic Complex and Pioneer Police Precinct. In total, 756 solar panels were added and they will provide between 17 percent and 92 percent of onsite annual electricity needs, depending on the facility. Continue reading →