07 Aug EcoAction Partners: 2017 Sustainability Report
The mission of Telluride-based EcoAction Partners is to inspire, initiate, and support collaborative community actions that enhance resilient economic, environmental, and social systems. EcoAction 2017 report tracks the region’s (San Miguel and Ouray counties) progress towards a more sustainable future.
From the desk of EcoAction’s executive director Heather Knox:
I am pleased to bring you our first EcoAction Report, which pulls together 7 years of data on Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions for our region. Created in 2007, EcoAction Partners continues to ful ll our mission to build outstanding partnerships to develop and implement sustainability programs in San Miguel and Ouray Counties.
From where I sit, I can hear Prospect Creek owing and powerful with snow melt from the ski area. Our snowpack is critical to our region. It draws tens of thousands of visitors from around the world to ski and do other sports; it is the basis of our winter economy. This watershed, originating in the San Juan Mountains, also supports plants, animals, and human life as it ows into the Colorado Basin. Our snowpack ultimately provides drinking water for millions of people in the cities of Phoenix, AZ & Los Angeles, CA. Wow! This little corner of Colorado is significant. We are all connected.
The federal government’s denial of the science supporting the rise in GHG emissions, and increased temperatures, is alarming. However, it is a wake-up call to ensure that we are doing all we can at the local level, both as individuals and as a community. Please take responsibility for your actions and voice support for state and regional programs that track and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Now is the time.
Thankfully our local governments are forward thinking. It was through an intergovernmental agreement between Telluride, Mountain Village and San Miguel County that EcoAction Partners (then The New Community Coalition) was created to serve as our region’s sustainability organization. Since then, EcoAction Partners has grown our regional network and now includes the founding partners AND the towns of Norwood, Ophir, Ridgway and the City of Ouray, and Ouray County. These governments participate in the Sneffels Energy Board, a regional group dedicated toward reducing regional greenhouse gas emissions and coordinated by EcoAction Partners since 2009 (more info in the pages that follow).
As participants in the Sneffels Energy Board, all governments have made great strides in reducing their own utility usage through lighting, weatherization and energy ef ciency upgrades and installing or offsetting with renewable energy systems. Through these efforts we have seen the government utility energy emissions reduce signi cantly, despite increased services across the region. Through these actions, governments are leading the way, but their emissions are only a small slice of the pie. About 97% of our Greenhouse Gas Emissions comes from the community.
EcoAction Partners collects and presents our community’s Greenhouse Gas Emissions data annually. We use this data to engage our constituents, and to target programs that promote energy effciency, renewable energy and GHG emission reductions.
The report that follows presents: our community’s greenhouse gas emissions data, actions that our government partners have taken to reduce their energy use, programs and rebates available through San Miguel Power Association, a key partner in energy reduction, and other EcoAction Partners programs. I hope you nd this information useful and an impetus to get involved!
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