“Without data, you’re just another person with an opinion.”
paleBLUEdot was engaged by the City of Chattanooga and green|spaces to compile a community wide greenhouse gas inventory. Data was collected and analyzed for the years 2008, 2013, and 2018.
The Value of The City of Chattanooga Community Greenhouse Gas Inventories
The goal of the city of Chattanooga community wide inventory is to estimate the GHG emissions associated with the activities of the people who live, work, learn, travel, visit, and recreate within the city’s geographical boundaries during three study years, 2008, 2013, and 2018. These inventories must be transparent and able to be replicated, updated, and compared with future assessments Chattanooga and assessments for peer cities.
Measuring the energy aspects of human activities and the associated GHG emissions offers a unique way to compare the effectiveness of various energy and sustainability best management practices. Greenhouse gas emissions and energy1 serve as common denominators for the comparison of kilowatts of electricity, natural gas therms, tons of coal, and gallons of liquid fuels consumed; as well as vehicle miles traveled, tons of waste processed, and gallons of potable water distributed. Every city prepares annual operating and capital improvement budgets. These assessments can be thought of as an assessment of the environmental budget for City operations. Recording these performance metrics is essential to promoting efficiency and sustainable change.
Chattanooga Community Wide GHG Emissions Overview
Community wide total emissions for the city of Chattanooga dropped 25.19% from 3,990,893 metric tonnes in 2008 to 2,985,483 metric tonnes in 2018. This decrease in community wide emissions occurred while Chattanooga’s economy grew. Between 2008 and 2018, while emissions were dropping, the city was able to grow it’s economy by 44% and adding 9.58% more jobs!
Read the full Chattanooga Community Greenhouse Gas Inventory report below: