Washington Supports Better Outcomes by Adding a Climate Lens to Comprehensive Plans

Can a zoning decision influence how a community is impacted by a flood or heat wave? Absolutely. A comprehensive plan is one of the most powerful tools for dealing with the impacts of climate change that a local government has. It sets a city or county’s emissions, its exposure to climate hazards, and its residents’ utility and insurance bills for decades, whether or not it sets out to.

Under the Growth Management Act, Washington’s largest counties and the cities within them are required to add a climate element to their comprehensive plans, while all other jurisdictions are encouraged to opt in. That work can be funded through climate planning grants administered by the Washington State Department of Commerce. Across more than 450 projects over the past two decades, SSG’s analysis has shown communities that adding a climate lens to the planning process is crucial to producing better outcomes for residents. 

Comprehensive plans set where and how a community grows, and that shapes its transportation, buildings, energy systems, and the emissions they generate. As SSG Principal Consultant Jeremy Murphy writes, weaving climate into these plans makes low-carbon outcomes easier to achieve than almost any other municipal mechanism. The reason is timing. The travel patterns and energy use built into a neighborhood endure for decades, and they are costly to change once the ground is broken.

Climate risk is not shared equally

Where the burden of climate impacts are felt is not distributed evenly across a community. For the City of Lakewood, Colorado, SSG paired a spatial equity index with local infrastructure and climate projections to identify which residents would struggle most to recover and where they live. For example, in the case of an extreme heat event, some neighbourhoods had both a higher likelihood of having elevated overnight temperatures while also having a high number of residents who are more vulnerable to heat-related health risks. Understanding which areas carry this profile of elevated risk and higher numbers of vulnerable residents gives cities a crucial way to prioritize where to direct adaptive actions such as cooling infrastructure or building retrofit programs.

A climate lens is also an affordability lens

A climate lens is an affordability lens. Buildings that are efficient and electrified cost less to run, which matters in a place like Airway Heights, where more than a quarter of structures predate 1999 and are expensive to heat and cool. Neighborhoods designed so people can reach daily destinations on foot, by bike, or by transit reduce the need to own and fuel a car, one of the largest fixed costs a household carries, while compact growth spares local governments the expense of extending far-flung infrastructure. When SSG modeled how different building standards would affect emissions in the City of Courtenay through 2050, the analysis gave the city the evidence it needed to require net-zero emissions for new buildings in its plan.

Comprehensive plans shape energy security

Comprehensive plans also shape a community’s energy future. Plans that make room for renewable energy and efficiency help protect residents against volatile fossil fuel prices and avoid locking in gas infrastructure that can later become a stranded cost. When SSG modelled the Washington state’s energy decarbonization pathways for the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, every viable pathway delivered more than $28 billion in net societal benefits compared with business as planned. The analysis showed that local renewable energy production plays an important role in supporting the transition away from fossil fuels as an energy source, and is one local jurisdictions can support. 

The case for the climate lens

For many Washington jurisdictions, adding a climate element is a choice rather than an obligation. The evidence from these projects points in one direction: it is the choice that leaves residents safer, spends public money more wisely, and holds up over the decades a comprehensive plan is meant to last. With Commerce grants available to fund the work, the case for making it is strong.