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In response to the climate crisis, many cities, municipalities and community-based organizations have stepped forward to advance the goals of clean, affordable, accessible, renewable energy for all at a local and state level. As entities seek to move forward with established local commitments, such as 100% renewable energy (e.g. Sierra Club’s R100 effort), the difficulty of accessing energy data, most of which is from national, state, or utility-specific data sets, creates an enormous gap in the ability of communities to advance their deep decarbonization and renewable energy goals. Communities, municipalities, and cities across the US are experiencing these same problems to varying degrees, with many recreating the wheel each time. This is onerous, timely, costly, and isolating. The ultimate goal of the Community Energy Dashboard project is to democratize energy action by providing open-source software and all the supporting documentation for any community to successfully use it.
To help communities turn energy data into an action plan, we train a cohort of local university students to serve as Community Energy Fellows. These graduate and undergraduate students will perform community outreach, helping towns and cities to request their data, organize and analyze it. They will also assist local organizers to present the findings to the community and guide them through some energy transition planning exercises based on the data analysis results. At the end of this initial outreach, each community will have an energy data dashboard that can be updated with new data from utilities and other sources so it remains current.
We are currently developing the next generation of the open-source community energy dashboard, which will support local climate action organizers on their path to decarbonization, including:
Creating a comprehensive CO2 inventory using energy utility and public data sources.
Setting science-based goals for CO2 emissions reductions.
Identifying risks due to climate change and opportunities to build resilience.
Incorporating energy equity indicators to reflect the value of broad access to clean energy.
Using a community engagement process to select actions that will meet their goals.
Providing step-by-step guidance on how to initiate and ramp up those actions.
Tracking progress against their goals by automatically updating the CO2 inventory.
POWER-D.city is currently seeking towns and cities to be part of the initial pilot. Ideal candidates have a population less than 100,000; have made a commitment to reducing their climate impact; and have identified a municipal office, committee, or community group to lead this work. Communities that are interested in participating should contact POWER-D.city to schedule an initial interview.
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