Upcoming Events:

Past Events:

May 29, 2012 - Public Event #2

The second public event tied all Climate Action and Energy Plan activities and ideas together: the green economy map, the collection of IdeaScale ideas, the mind map, the wedges workshop and the best practices. Sustainability Solutions Group summarized the project to date and gave an overview of the top five best practices for North Cowichan to consider. In groups, participants then examined specific ideas in greater detail to determine how these ideas would be implemented and what challenges might be faced. This event generated 20 carefully considered ideas that were analyzed in terms of:

• Actions required (i.e. revise bylaw, create program, engage volunteers)

• Timeline (immediate, short term, mid-term, long term)

• Priority level (low, medium, high)

• Champion organization (i.e. Municipality, citizens group, BC Hydro)

• Support organizations (i.e. citizens groups)

• Desired outcomes (measurable products of the actions)

• Funding sources (i.e. Community Futures, Provincial Government, credit union)

• Measures of success (i.e. increase in... by x amount, decrease in... by y amount)

February, 2012 - Wedges Workshop

We hosted a workshop in February with representatives from the City, business, not-forprofits and the public. The focus was to determine which North Cowichan-specific collected strategies might be used to achieve an emissions reduction target of 33% below North Cowichan's 2007 emissions levels. Each strategy was represented as a wedge depicting the size of that strategy's emissions reduction effect. Wedges were placed on a graph to see which ones could be combined to go from 2020 emissions to the 33% reduction target.

The major findings from this workshop were:

• 33% reduction is very challenging

• Need to focus on transportation & housing

• Some strategies don’t have high impact, but are easy to implement or highly desirable

• Strategies are interdependent

• 2020 is a short time frame – need to plan further

Best Practices

Sustainability Solutions Group put together a best practices document, with guidance from the Climate Change Advisory Committee (a citizens group of Council) and the Strategic Action Group (a group of North Cowichan department staff). These practices showcase what has been done in other municipalities around the world and how these successes might be transferred to the local context. North Cowichan can particularly benefit from some of the innovative transportation strategies in towns in Europe, Quebec and elsewhere.

Take a look at the Best Practices .

December 2011 - February 2012 - IdeaScale

Citizens contributed their ideas and discussion to IdeaScale, the ideas forum.  All ideas will be considered for further development in the CAEP. The top ten ideas as voted by the 200 users as of June 2012 are:

1. Air Dry Laundry

2. Rail Service

3. Local Organic Food

4. Municipal Forests

5. Green Building Courses

6. Curbside Compost

7. Ban Backyard Burning

8. Geothermal Energy Systems

9. Public Transit

10. Echo Heights Forest Protection

We created a mind map to describe how these ideas can be related in the Climate Action and Energy Plan.

December 8, 2011 - Public Event #1

With more than 90 people in attendance, the first public event was a great success. Participants were given an overview of the project, the ideas forum at IdeaScale was introduced, and a green economy mapping session was hosted.