Orange County NC Website
1) The Chapel Hill - Carrboro City School system and OWASA both have separate policy, fiscal, and <br />administrative processes from the Town, and therefore, different boards and staff. They also <br />have larger emissions, facilities and operating budgets than Carrboro has, and therefore, an <br />ability to have a greater influence on emissions reductions; <br />2) Transit is a public service that has the ability to significantly mitigate emissions. Chapel Hill <br />Transit is a cooperative effort between Carrboro, Chapel Hill and UNC; GoTriangle is a multi - <br />county /regional transit authority serving over a million people; <br />3) Currently, Carrboro on its own has very limited influence on larger electricity and natural gas <br />utilities. Duke Energy provides electrical service to over 90% of Carrboro. Carrboro is also <br />served by Piedmont Electric Membership Cooperative, which buys its electricity from Duke for <br />resale. PSNC is the local natural gas provider. This is in contrast to local governments operating <br />municipal utilities. <br />4) Carrboro's largest emissions sector is buildings, with most building emissions being residential, <br />and most of the residential building sector being non -owner occupied. Oversight by the North <br />Carolina Utilities Commission, management by the above utilities, and regulation by building <br />codes (which are established at state /federal levels) are strong non - market /public sector drivers <br />that influence emissions from buildings. Landowner and landlord management and decisions <br />are strong private sector drivers. Social /cultural norms influence both public and private <br />sectors. <br />5) The Town has very limited oversight of Homeowners Associations (HOAs) (less in fact than the <br />state of North Carolina). Carrboro did recently update regulations to limit new HOAs ability to <br />constrain an individual homeowner's desire to pursue sustainability measures. <br />Table 1: Local Climate Action Planning is One Layer in a Continuum 16 <br />Organizational Scale <br />General Scale <br />Climate Action <br />Examples <br />(population) <br />"Primary Domain" Examples <br />Personal <br />1 person <br />Personal choices (e.g., dietary, housing, transportation, <br />vocation, financial, consumer) <br />Household /family <br />—2 -10 people <br />"Home economics" (e.g., housing, transportation, <br />landscaping /gardening, financial, consumer) <br />Neighborhoods, small <br />—10 -100 <br />Small organization organizing, management, fossil fuel <br />businesses, clubs, <br />people <br />divestment <br />nonprofits, congregations <br />Schools, co -ops, larger clubs, <br />—100 -1000 <br />Business /organization planning and management; fossil <br />businesses, congregations, <br />people <br />fuel divestment <br />corporations <br />16 This table does not fully address continuums of access to capital and decision making authority, nor to <br />sociological and cultural dimensions; all add complexity. The point of this table is to illustrate that climate action <br />transcends all scales, and to help define the "space" in which community scale climate action planning occurs. <br />0 <br />