Submitted by Ryan Matheson, BPSA Climate Action Program Manager
The Bruce Peninsula Biosphere Association (BPBA) and the Municipal Climate Action Committee are creating a Community Climate Action Plan (CCAP). The plan looks at the ways in which our local climate is changing, examines how our community is contributing to climate change, and most importantly, it outlines the steps we must take to reduce our local carbon emissions. Ideally, the CCAP will serve as a long-term planning document that will guide the municipality and our community to take meaningful climate action.
Five main components make up the plan. These include:
1) Electrify Everything: Ontario has a relatively low emission energy grid, making it a great place to move to electric heating (think heat pumps rather than propane) and electric vehicles or hybrids.
2) Reduce Consumption: We must cut consumption of energy wherever possible – walk or bike rather than driving, make our homes more efficient, and make small changes to our habits in the ways we use appliances, lights, and everywhere else we use energy.
3) Wipe Out Waste: More (and better) recycling, composting, and reuse is crucial to keeping our Peninsula clean and beautiful while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
4) Nurture Nature: Not only are the forests, streams, and ecosystems on the Peninsula our most valuable assets, ensuring they remain healthy and that we adopt environmentally sensitive practices in areas like agriculture ensure their future survival and help mitigate climate change.
5) Protect the Peninsula: We must accept that some effects of climate change are now inevitable, and so we must prepare. This means focussing on protecting the Peninsula and those who live and work here by being ready for heatwaves, more intense storms, high water, and forest fires that will likely come our way.
Certainly, this plan is not enough on its own: addressing climate change requires more than just individual actions by our community in order to be addressed. Political action, transformation of industry, and a host of other societal changes are outside of the scope of this plan but no less important to the cause. Yet the CCAP is crucial to getting our own house in order. It sets us on a path to reduce our contribution to climate change that we can still avoid and prepare for the elements for which we cannot. It represents a strong start – not a clear end – to a journey with much further to go.
The BPBA is encouraging residents to get involved – there is plenty left to do and many ways to engage with the plan. Share your ideas, whether it’s feedback, stories, discussion, or questions. Make your voice heard by sharing your thoughts on why the plan is important and what you want to see. Finally, we need to act on climate change! This is a plan created by the community, with the community, and for the community, and no matter your age, income, or interest in the environment, there are things you can do to be a part of the efforts to preserve our beautiful Peninsula.
Read a draft summary of the CCAP at letstalknbp.ca/climate-action where you can share your thoughts, are you can submit your comments and ideas to Climate.Action@bpba.ca.
