Category Archives: 2023

Plastic Free July: Learn to Live Without the Plastic

By SLCgreen Intern Kellen Hunnicutt

Graphic with two columns of images. Right "instead of" column has common single-use plastics trash of a plastic grocery bag, take-out fork and straw, plastic water bottle, and a to-go cup and containers Left "try" column has images of reusable items of a coffee mug, food container, cloth and net shopping bags, and reusable straws and utensils.

We live in a world that loves plastic. From grocery stores to coffee shops to our bathroom sinks, we see plastic pretty much everywhere. It makes sense. Plastic is lightweight, cheap, durable, and malleable, and in many cases, it serves an instrumental purpose. It keeps our food clean and safe from contamination, is ubiquitous in hospitals and clinics, enables home insulation and energy efficiency, and reduces the weight of cars, which saves gas.  

The problem is not these long-lasting or health safety-related uses of plastic. The problem is that we make and use a remarkable amount of unnecessary single-use plastic. Single-use plastics are items like bottled water, plastic grocery bags, and coffee cups that we throw out after only one use.

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Clear the Air, Ride Your Bike

By SLCgreen Staff Judith Westwood

Woman riding her bike home from work.

Public Lands Planner, Kira Johnson, rides her bike five miles to and from work daily. She started bike commuting out of necessity but quickly fell in love with it. She explains, “I didn’t have a car in college, but I had a bike. Thankfully, I had a friend in the same situation, and we got into bike commuting at the same time. We found a lot of childlike thrill doing it.” Several years later, when Kira got her first car, she found she still preferred to bike.   

Bike commuting has a lot of great benefits. You stay more active, you interact with your community differently, and you can save a lot of money. Bike commuting is also a great way to reduce your emissions and air pollution impact, and to participate in this month’s Clear the Air Challenge.  

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It’s Time To Clear The Air! 

by SLCgreen intern Charlie Bonkowsky 

Graphic reads: Take the Clear The Air Challenge July 2023 with a graphic of a mountain range and a clear blue sky

It’s almost time for The Clear The Air Challenge—an annual event encouraging Utahns to reduce their vehicle emissions and help keep Utah’s air clean! The competition starts on July 1st and runs throughout the month, with a goal this year of eliminating 100,000 single-car trips and keeping 375 tons of CO2 out of the atmosphere. 

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It’s a Bee-autiful Day to Learn About Beekeeping! 

By SLCgreen intern Kellen Hunnicutt 

It’s Pollinator Week! So we’re highlighting the role beekeeping plays in protecting Utah’s instrumental pollinators. Plus it can be a fun hobby if you’re up for the challenge! RyLee Curtis, a Utah resident, and bee-lover, has been beekeeping as a hobby for five years and is excited to share the knowledge she’s gained with the SLCgreen community. 

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Celebrate National Pollinator Week!

by SLCgreen Intern Emma Johnson

Image shows a butterfly pollinating a group of flowers

 
Pollinator Week is an annual celebration of the essential pollination services that bees, birds, bats, butterflies, and other insects provide. Pollination services are vital for agricultural success, general biodiversity, and overall ecosystem health. Pollinator numbers, especially insects, have been drastically falling for the past several decades. There is so much we can do to support our pollinators, but the first step is increasing awareness. Here is some information about pollinators in Utah and what you can do to help them: 

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Salt Lake City Approves Ordinance Update to Expand Electric Vehicle Charging at New Multi-Family Properties

One of the many ways Salt Lake City works to improve air quality is by making it easier to own an electric vehicle, which doesn’t emit any tailpipe pollution.

On that topic, we’re excited to report that theSalt Lake City Council enacted our proposed electric vehicle readiness standards on April 4!

This will enable more residents to charge their vehicles at home if they live in a new multi-family building.

The electric vehicle readiness standards were adopted as part of the Off-Street Parking ordinance (21A.44) and will require multi-family new-construction properties to include electric vehicle ready (EV-ready) infrastructure at 20% of installed parking spaces. It does not require that the EV stations themselves be installed; only the electric capacity and conduit to make it that much easier to put in a station as demand increases.

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Salt Lake City and three other local governments award grants to four carbon dioxide removal projects

In October 2022, Salt Lake City joined the 4 Corners Carbon Coalition to support projects that will advance large scale carbon dioxide removal efforts and fight the climate crisis. A few months later, the Coalition reviewed and made selections among a competitive pool of projects. We’re excited to announce that $389k in funding was granted to four concrete production projects that will remove carbon from the atmosphere.

The projects are located in Colorado and Arizona, but we hope to encourage more innovation in this space here in Salt Lake City!

Why carbon dioxide removal as a strategy municipalities should suport?

We know that energy intensive industrial operations are a major culprit of carbon dioxide pollution and climate change. It may come to a surprise, however, that the cement industry alone is responsible for nearly 7% of the world’s emissions, and the global demand for concrete is expected to increase for decades to come, according to the The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), making this an important sector to decarbonize.

Thankfully, the 4 Corners Carbon Coalition was able to grant funding to four projects that are exploring innovative ways to create concrete while actually removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. There is huge potential for these types of projects to go large scale and be replicated around the globe.

To learn more about the 4 Corners Carbon Coalition and the funded projects, check out the press release below and this TechChrunch feature.

PRESS RELEASE

March 7, 2023

Innovation grants awarded to four concrete production projects that will suck carbon from the atmosphere

Coalition of local governments aims to spur carbon dioxide removal efforts, fight climate crisis through this funding

A coalition of cities and counties in the Western United States has awarded $389k in funding to four projects that fight climate change by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through the production of concrete. The 4 Corners Carbon Coalition — a partnership of Boulder County, CO, Flagstaff, AZ, Salt Lake City, UT, and Santa Fe, NM — pools resources to provide grants to accelerate carbon dioxide removal (CDR) project deployment and business development in the Four Corners region.

Through a competitive application process, the coalition received nearly $800k in funding requests before selecting four organizations for grants: CarbonBuilt, Citizens for Clean Energy Inc., Minus Materials, and Travertine Technologies. Recipients of the coalition’s inaugural round of catalytic grant funding will support projects that integrate CDR with real-world concrete production.

During the selection process, a panel of international experts in climate research, CDR technology, and concrete and construction materials reviewed proposals. The panel  evaluated local replicability, potential for scaling, carbon removal volume, and benefits to workforce, justice, health, and ecology.

“The 4 Corners Carbon Coalition is a shining example of how local governments are acting together to fight the climate crisis,” said Susie Strife, Director of Boulder County’s Office of Sustainability, Climate Action & Resilience. “Pooling resources can amplify innovation and the creative deployment of the integration of carbon removal and concrete. These awardees will turn their breakthroughs into real world projects right here in the Western United States and we are thrilled to provide seed funding to catalyze this work.” 

“We couldn’t be happier with the quality of the applications received,” said Nicole Antonopoulos, Director of the City of Flagstaff Sustainability Office.  “It was just over three years ago that our community, like hundreds of others around the nation and the globe, called for the formal declaration of a Climate Emergency and outlined the goal of carbon neutrality.  In doing so, the Flagstaff community also made it clear that avoidance-based offsets would not satisfy. As such, we’ve worked to establish partnerships to begin to develop a portfolio of regional projects that support the development and deployment of meaningful carbon removal.  These projects do just that, and this outcome would not have been possible without Boulder County, Flagstaff, Salt Lake City and Santa Fe all working together as partners.”

CDR describes processes that pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and lock it away in geological, biological, and synthetic formations for decades, centuries, or even millennia. Carbon dioxide removal is necessary because carbon dioxide reduction alone will not address the climate crisis. According to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), cutting emissions from fossil fuels is necessary, but it’s no longer sufficient to stem the worst effects of climate change.  

Concrete production is responsible for more than 7% of the world’s emissions and is the second-most consumed product globally after potable water. The concrete industry is highly distributed due to the nature of the product. Solutions that integrate CDR into concrete production have huge potential to scale and be replicated in local communities around the globe.

Selected projects:

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Food Waste Drop-off Options for Multi-Family Residents (and anyone else!)

We all know composting is an important aspect of sustainability- it’s the most local form of recycling!

The US wastes approximately 40% of all food— that is approximately $408 billion worth of food thrown away each year.

However, using your Salt Lake City curbside compost carts for green yard waste and eligible food scraps (fruit and vegetable scraps, eggshells, coffee grounds, tea bags) can help! Your brown containers divert organic waste to be composted at the local Salt Lake Valley Landfill. Purchasing the finished product for use in your yard or garden then creates a closed loop!

Participating in some form of composting– whether through our curbside program or by composting at home— helps mitigate climate change, and if you use the end product in your garden, helps with soil erosion, plant health, and more! Recycling food and yard waste creates a healthier environment for our communities.

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2022 Year in Review

We are officially well into 2023 and ready to share our full 2022 Year in Review with you! You might’ve caught our teasers on social media of what we’ve accomplished this past year but in case you missed it or want to read the full review, we’ve got you covered.

This past year we worked hard to provide sustainability in Salt Lake City, at both the city and local levels. Keep scrolling to catch a few highlights, and be sure to check out the full Year in Review for all the incredible work we did in 2022!

WASTE + RECYCLING

2022 Accomplishments

  • Emptied 4.3 million containers and provided weekly waste collection for approximately 42,000 residential customers.
  • Provide waste and recycling services for City parks and facilities, special events throughout the City, and curbside recycling for qualified small businesses and multi-family properties
  • Partnered with three local artists to create new wraps on our newest refuse trucks.

AIR QUALITY

2022 Accomplishments

  • Hosted an Indoor Air Quality Summit and launched a new public campaign to share best practices around keeping our homes, buildings, schools, and other spaces healthy.
  • Submitted a grant application for an EV car share pilot program at affordable housing properties
  • Expanded the City’s Comprehensive Sustainability Policy so that all new construction and major renovations of large City buildings will, when practicable, be constructed to use all-electric, combustion-free technologies.
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Salt Lake City launches microgrant to increase food equity in the community

PRESS RELEASE: February 2, 2022

Salt Lake City is launching its first-ever Food Equity Microgrant program to increase resident access to fresh, healthy, affordable, and culturally relevant food.

The grant application is now live and open to individuals, local businesses, and certain community organizations. The initiative is designed to support community-led projects in line with the recommendations coming out of the City’s Resident Food Equity Advisors’ report released in 2021.

“Salt Lake City is committed to listening and responding to the ideas, dreams, and suggestions of our residents,” said Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall. “The Resident Food Equity Advisors is an example of that. They gave us their insight and recommendations on how to strengthen our food system and this microgrant program is one of the ways we’re responding to their report. I can’t wait to see which projects we can support in the community with this funding.”

Administered by the City’s Sustainability Department, the microgrant program has a total budget of $35,000. Individuals may apply for grants of $250 to grow or raise their own food and community grants up to $5,000 are available for organizations.

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