San Luis Obispo, Goleta earn first and second place in multi-state clean energy challenge

GOLETA, Calif. - The City of San Luis Obispo and Goleta announced they earned first and second place in the 2020 Sustainable States Community Energy Challenge. 

The August competition included 30 communities from five states including California, Maryland, Connecticut, Minnesota and New Jersey.

The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) examined the participating cities’ efforts to make homes and buildings more energy efficient, to scale up the use of renewable energy, and to ensure community involvement in developing equitable clean-energy policies.

“We found that even quite small cities and towns can take meaningful action to cut energy waste and reduce carbon emissions,” said David Ribeiro, director of local policy at ACEEE. “A number of critical tools to fight climate change—and to do so in an equitable way—are things that have to be set locally. From the largest cities to the smallest ones, they’re all going to need to step up further. We hope some of these leading cities can help show the way for their peers.”

First place in the challenge went to San Luis Obispo and second place went to Goleta. Third place went to St. Louis Park (Minnesota) followed by Manhattan Beach, West Hollywood, West Hartford (Connecticut), Rockville (Maryland), Dublin (California) and Red Wing (Minnesota) (tied), and Rochester (Minnesota).

“The City of Goleta is honored to be recognized for promoting sustainability in our local government operations and in the community," said Goleta Mayor Paula Perotte. "We are fortunate to have outstanding City staff who are dedicated to delivering on our sustainability commitments.  We envision our current and future city to be a cleaner, greener Goleta for all residents, and we will continue to strive today and tomorrow for a better future.”

ACEEE evaluated each of the communities on policy metrics assessing government operations, community initiatives, buildings policies, and energy and water utilities.

The analysis assessed policies and programs to make energy efficiency upgrades in homes and businesses, accelerate the adoption of renewable energy, set long-term commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and establish and enforce building codes.

Goleta earned points in all categories, most notably for the City Council adopted 100% community-wide renewable energy by 2030 and 50% renewable energy at municipal facilities by 2025 goals, green building policies, LED streetlight acquisition and support programs for building energy code compliance.

For more information on SLO's clean energy plans, click here.

For more information on Goleta's clean energy plans, click here.