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Article Excerpt
Introduction
I. Urban Climate Governance A. International Context B. Local Government and Climate Governance in the United Kingdom C. Local Government and Climate Governance in the United States II. Climate Policy and Action in London A. London's Socio-Economic and Environmental Profile B. Competencies and Powers for Climate Governance in London C. The Evolution of Climate Change Policy in London D. Climate Governance in Action III. Climate Policy and Action in Los Angeles A. Los Angeles's Socio-Economic and Environmental Profile. B. Competencies and Powers for Climate Governance in Los Angeles C. The Evolution of Climate Change Policy in Los Angeles D. Climate Governance in Action IV. Comparing London and Los Angeles: Modes of Governing and the Role of Law A. Self-Governing B. Control and Compliance C. Provision D. Enabling E. Summary Conclusion
INTRODUCTION
Cities are increasingly recognized as significant producers and able managers of carbon emission. (1) They have become the predominant source of anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions--perhaps as much as 70% by some accounts (2)--and places where vulnerability to climate change may be acute. For the world's major cities, climate change is therefore becoming an issue of increasing political and environmental significance. But how cities go about addressing the issue of climate change is not yet well understood. The competency and capacity of local government to address a multi-layered environmental problem such as climate change is largely determined by the legal structures within which it is embedded, but also by factors such as critical individuals, past successes, business consensus, public opinion, market opportunities, and environmental advocacy. (3)
Climate change policy at national and international levels has developed significantly over the past two decades. In 1992, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change was adopted at the Rio Summit with countries pledging to "prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system" and to inventory and report on their greenhouse gas ("GHG") emissions. (4) In 1997, the Kyoto Protocol established mandatory targets for industrialized countries to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases by 2008 through 2012, along with a range of economic instruments designed to assist with this goal. (5) Over the past decade, negotiations have continued as the economic instruments of the Kyoto Protocol, including the Clean Development Mechanism, Emissions Trading, and Joint Implementation, were finalized. (6) Although not all countries are on track to meet their targets under the Kyoto Protocol--and the United States remains outside of it--negotiations are now under way to develop a "post-2012" agreement. (7) To date, most analysis has focused on the role of nation-states in the design, promotion, and implementation of various "post-2012" policy architectures and instruments. A growing body of literature is pointing to the emergence of a range of non-nation state actors, such as multinational companies, carbon trading and offset organizations, and global cities, that have entered this policy arena and have developed their own initiatives and approaches to addressing this issue. (8)
This Article examines how global cities are governing climate change. Part I of this Article provides an overview of the national and international contexts of urban climate governance focusing on the United Kingdom and the United States. Parts II and III analyze London and Los Angeles, repectively, as examples of global cities. They provide a thorough examination of climate change policies and actions in these two cities, based on approximately thirty in-depth interviews with government, business and civil society representatives during 2007-08, as well as official documents and grey literature. Part IV then examines the modes of governance to understand what role law plays in urban efforts to mitigate climate change.
I. URBAN CLIMATE GOVERNANCE
The development of an explicitly urban approach to climate change governance owes much to the emergence of transnational municipal networks focused specifically on this issue in the early 1990s. (9) Since the early-2000s, these networks have evolved to become both more comprehensive and more politically significant, particularly with the development of the C40 network of global cities. (10) They have provided municipalities with inspiration, concrete projects, access to funding, examples of best practices, and informal structures of recognition and reward which have led to a significant response from municipalities worldwide. (11)
A. International Context
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, a number of cities, primarily in North America and Europe, began to adopt targets and timetables for reducing their emissions of GHGs. (12) These efforts became organized internationally through the formation of three transnational municipal networks: Cities for Climate Protection ("CCP"), (13) Climate Alliance, (14) and Energie-Cites. (15) CCP was formed in 1992 as an initiative of the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives ("ICLEI"). ICLEI first became involved with municipal climate policy through the Urban C[O.sub.2] Reduction Project, (16) which ran from 1991 to 1993 and was funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the City of Toronto, and several private foundations. (17) Municipal membership of the CCP network initially reflected these origins with a concentration of members from North America and Europe, but has since expanded with specific campaigns in Australia, Canada, Europe, Latin America, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and the United States. (18) CCP members pledge to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases by between 10-20% from 1990 levels by 2010; member cities are now thought to account for 15% of world urban emissions. (19) The Climate Alliance has 1,100 members in seventeen European countries, with the aim to reduce emissions to 50% below 1990 levels by 2030. The network is based in Frankfurt am Main and most of its members are located in continental Europe (Germany, Austria and the Netherlands). (20) Energie-Cites stemmed from a project funded by the EU Commission and is a somewhat different network, with an explicit focus on local energy policy in which addressing climate change is only one factor. Founded in 1990 and based in France, it now has over 160 individual members in twenty-five European countries, with a concentration in francophone nations. (21)
During the 1990s and early 2000s, urban governance on climate change was primarily orchestrated through these three networks. In the mid-2000s, a new wave of transnational municipal networks emerged. The first of these was the 2005 United States Conference of Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, (22) in which cities pledged "to meet or beat the Kyoto Protocol targets in their own communities." (23) ICLEI has since supported the development of the World Mayors Council on Climate Change with the explicit purpose "to politically promote climate protection policies at the local level." (24) In the case of the global cities discussed this Article, the emergence of the C40 network has been a critical development. (25) This network was promoted by the Mayor of London and The Climate Group and formed by eighteen cities in 2005 as a parallel initiative to the Group of Eight ("G8") Gleneagles summit on climate change. (26) In 2006, the C40 network entered into a partnership with the Clinton Climate Initiative and expanded its membership to include forty of the largest cities in the world and changed its name to the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group. (27)
In December 2007, local government representatives met in Bali, Indonesia during COP-13 to convene a two-day conference during which they adopted a World Mayors and Local Governments Climate Protection Agreement. (28) The agreement is loosely modeled on the United States Conference of Mayors Climate Protection Agreement and sets forth six commitments that are more explicit than those upon which country delegates were able to agree in the international negotiations. The first commitment calls on local governments to "REDUCE greenhouse gas emissions immediately and significantly. Measure and report on annual reductions of greenhouse gas emissions and constantly work to increase reductions such that by 2050 greenhouse gas emissions will be reduced worldwide by 60% from 1990 levels and by 80% from 1990 levels in industrialized countries." (29) ICLEI also sent a delegation larger than any single country and second only to the delegation representing trade interests under the International Emissions Trading Association. (30)
As this brief history suggests, there is a growing movement internationally for urban responses to climate change. These networks have provided municipalities with inspiration, concrete projects, access to funding, examples of best practices, and informal structures of recognition and reward which have led to a significant response from municipalities worldwide. (31) The extent to which municipal governments are able to address climate change, however, also depends on their competencies in this area, and it is to the role of local government in climate governance in the United Kingdom and the United States that we now turn.
B. Local Government and Climate Governance in the United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, the relationship between central government and local authorities is governed by the legal principle of ultra vires: "local councils have been able to do only what they are statutorily permitted to do. Their rights and competences are not general, but specific." (32) "The statutory duties set by central government can be compulsory ... dictating the activities local authorities must undertake, or discretionary, allowing for flexibility in the priority given to different measures and the ways in which they are implemented." (33) Nonetheless, local government in the United Kingdom enjoys some financial independence. The mixture of specific competences and local discretion has led some commentators to argue that local government in the United Kingdom enjoys "partial autonomy." (34) While the Greater London Authority ("GLA"), the level of government responsible for metropolitan climate policy, is not constituted as a local authority but rather as a devolved administration, the competencies and powers are similar to those of local authorities in the climate change area. (35)
During the 1990s and early 2000s, this partial autonomy was evident in relation to urban climate change policy. Despite the lack of any explicit statutory duties to address climate change, local authorities in the United Kingdom had various duties that related to climate protection. Following the 1995 Home Energy Conservation Act, local authorities had a duty to report on the energy efficiency standards of their housing stock and the ability to take measures to improve it. (36) The introduction of Best Value Performance Indicators in the late 1990s included an indicator for energy use in council buildings, as well as statutory targets for increasing the recycling and composting of waste. (37) National guidance on Local Transport Plans and in the form of Planning Policy Statements also provided scope for addressing emissions of greenhouse gases through improving the energy efficiency of new developments, reducing the need to travel and encouraging the development of renewable energy. (38) In addition, through the Transport Act 2000, local authorities were given the powers to implement congestion and workplace charging schemes. (39) Exercise of this power has been very limited, with congestion charging confined to London and a small scheme in Durham, in the north-east of England. At the same time as fulfilling these duties, there is a high level of discretion for local authorities in interpreting government guidance and the new duty of "well being," introduced in the Local Government Act 2000, allows local governments to pursue any activities which they consider will promote the economic, social, or environmental well-being of their areas, both of which provide municipal government with considerable scope to implement climate policy.
In the absence of central government direction, however, specific climate protection strategies per se have historically been rare. Some local authorities, including Cambridgeshire, Kirklees, Leicester, Newcastle, and Southampton, developed energy or climate change strategies in the early 1990s. (40) It was following the CCP-UK pilot, (41) and the subsequent development of the Nottingham Declaration in 2000 (42), however, that local authorities in the United Kingdom began to develop systematic climate change action plans. Since 2000, over 300 local authorities have signed the Nottingham Declaration, (43) and municipal interest and innovation in urban climate change governance has increased. This has, in part, resulted from increasing direction from national government to local authorities in the arena of climate policy, as well as a growing interest among a number of national climate change related agencies (for example, the Energy Savings Trust and the Carbon Trust) in the role of local government. (44) This has been most notable in the area of land-use planning. Planning Policy Statement 1 ("PPSI"), published in 2005, provides the framework for spatial planning in the United Kingdom and specifically states that:
Regional planning bodies and local planning authorities should ensure that development plans contribute to global sustainability by addressing the causes and potential impacts of climate change--through policies which reduce energy use, reduce emissions (for example, by encouraging patterns of development which reduce the need to travel by private car, or reduce the impact of moving freight), promote the development of renewable energy resources, and take climate change impacts into account in the location and design of development. (45)
Previous planning guidance suggested that the potential for regions to mitigate climate change and their vulnerability to impacts should be "considered," (46) or that planners should "promote the energy efficiency of new housing where possible." (47) However, the language of PPS1 is clearer: planning bodies and authorities need to ensure that both the causes and impacts of climate change are addressed. (48) Local authorities have also been proactive in this area. In 2004, following the publication of national planning guidance on renewable energy, the London Borough of Merton introduced a target for all major new developments (those comprising over ten dwellings or 1000[m.sup.2] of non-residential development) of providing 10% of energy use through on-site renewable energy generation to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide. The "Merton Rule" has now been adopted, in some form, by thirty-four local governments in the United Kingdom with a further sixty-three "actively progressing" its use. (49) In 2007, a supplementary planning policy statement, Planning and Climate Change has been published. (50) Here, the role of spatial planning in addressing climate change is seen to be five-fold:
secure enduring progress against the United Kingdom's emissions targets ... deliver the Government's ambition of zero carbon development ... shape sustainable communities that are resilient to and appropriate for the climate change now accepted as inevitable ... create an attractive environment for innovation and for the private sector to bring forward investment ... capture local enthusiasm and give local communities a real opportunity to influence, and take, action on climate change. (51)
Interestingly, this guidance points not only to the regulatory role of planning, but also to its potential in engaging and enabling others--notably the private sector and "communities." This discourse reflects what some commentators have termed a transition from "a unitary to a multiple system for governing local communities--from local government to local governance." (52) During the 1990s, "local authorities became less extensively involved in the direct provision of education, housing, public transport, social and other services. Instead, they increasingly 'enabled' other agencies, the voluntary sector and the private sector to provide these services." (53) This approach to local government is also reflected in the development of Local Strategic Partnerships ("LSPs"), sustainable community strategies, and Local Area Agreements ("LAAs") as the vehicles through which local policy and action are mandated. (54) Through successive Local Government Acts during the 2000s, the Labour Administration has bought forward a system in which LSPs, consisting of local government and other stakeholders, develop both a sustainable community strategy and a set of up to thirty-five priorities and targets from a set of 198 indicators as a focus for local action, which are formalized in an agreement with national government known as an LAA. Of the 198 indicators, five relate to addressing climate change: (55)
185: C[O.sub.2] reduction from local authority operations
186: per captia reductions of C[O.sub.2] emissions in the local authority area
187: tackling fuel poverty--% of people receiving income based benefits living in homes with a low energy efficiency rating
188: planning to adapt to climate change
189: flood and costal erosion risk management (56)
Significantly, in a survey of the most frequently selected priorities for the first round of LAA (2008-2011), the Local Government Association found that reducing C[O.sub.2] emissions was the fifth most selected performance indicator (selected in 100 out of the total 150 LAA), ranking above issues such as reducing childhood obesity, crime, educational attainment, and cultural cohesion. (57) While this is a significant indicator of the current importance attached to local government responses to climate change, it remains to be seen how authorities will fare in actually seeking to achieve this goal in the short and long term.
The overall picture of competencies for addressing climate change among United Kingdom local authorities is a complex one. On the one hand, central government has become increasingly involved in "directing" local government in this area, particularly through new planning guidance and national performance indicators. On the other hand, these remain areas for local government discretion--there is no statutory responsibility to follow this guidance--and there is also considerable scope for local government to act on climate change through other means, including through their own estate, in arenas of housing and transport policy, and through the increasingly regulated area of biodegradable waste. (58) Partial autonomy remains a valid description of the competencies of local government in this area, albeit that the increasing political and public salience of the issue has led to a greater level of involvement by United Kingdom local authorities than was the case in the late 1990s. At the same time, it is clear that the general trend towards a system of "local governance" rather than "government" is visible in the urban climate policy arena. There is emphasis on the role of...
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