Our Activities

ICLEI is developing a Green City Action Plan for the city of Kota Kinabalu following a multi-stakeholder consultative process, as a part of the Asian Development Bank’s (ABD) development of Green City Action Plans in the BIMP-EAGA region (comprised of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and East Timor). The City of Kota Kinabalu is committing to inclusive, ambitious climate action, mainstreaming climate actions and strategies in to its development agenda to contribute in achieving regional and national climate goals. A greenhouse gas (GHG) Emissions Inventory and climate vulnerability assessment was prepared through a series of face-to-face interactive workshops with representatives of all concerned departments and stakeholders. Priority sectors and solutions for low-carbon climate-resilient development in Kota Kinabalau was defined, addressing the scale of finance and viable implementation models.

The Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Removals Estimates (SEEG) is an initiative of the Climate Observatory that includes the production of annual estimates of GHG emissions in Brazil, analytical documents on the evolution of emissions and a web portal to provide simple and clear system methods and data. The SEEG methodology was published in the journal NATURE in 2018.ICLEI works on the estimation of GHG emissions related to the waste sector, in addition to providing data to subnational governments, so that they take ownership of the issue. Methodologies defined by the IPCC are applied. SEEG provides annual estimates and technical emission data for all Brazilian states.

The 2019 European Mobility Week (EMW) project guides and aggregates volunteer local action for EcoMobility. This campaign in Korea accelerates sustainable mobiliy actions at the local level by voluntarily setting cities’ plan of weekly activities and permanent policy change. ICLEI’s one week campaign helps local governments to raise citizens’ awareness about sustainable mobility and its effects and linkage with climate change and contribution to sustainable development. Activities within the campaign include the creation of regional forums around sustainable mobility, educational programming, and car-free days for public offices. These activities often draw media attention, which can add to the civic awareness and participation.

ICLEI established a replicable framework that can be used by local governments throughout the country to attribute the observed changes in community GHG emissions inventories. Practitioners within cities and counties are now able to harness data to produce a more accurate depiction in changes to community-scale efficiency, communicate those trends more clearly, and use the data to evaluate the effectiveness of policies and programs. The project components are development of the Contribution Analysis methodology; application of the techniques of Contribution Analysis to a range of community types to illustrate the drivers of change in various communities; production of a “replication toolkit” which clearly describes the steps in the process, provides guidance and templates for additional communities to adopt and take forward; and distrbution of these new resources widely.

This workshop will provide an overview of global trends in environmental disclosure and reporting in 2019 in light of the recent announcement of CDP and ICLEI’s joint unified reporting system. Workshop participants will gain expanded knowledge of global city climate policy and new trends in reporting and measuring environmental impact, an overview of CDP and ICLEI’s unified reporting system, and a comprehensive briefing on the technical changes and guidance on the current questionnaires.

Since 2008, ICLEI’s Cities Biodiversity Center (CBC) has convened successive summits as official parallel events to the Conference on Biological Diversity COP, to enable local and subnational governments engagement. These Summits have resulted in strong political outcomes, including the Quintana Roo (2016) and Sharm El-Sheikh (2018) Communiques, Nagoya Plan of Action on Subnational Governments, Cities and Other Local Authorities for Biodiversity (2011 – 2020), adopted at COP 10 in 2010, and of many decisions on local and subnational governments. Through these outcomes, ICLEI CBC has shaped a global policy environment that supports local and regional governments in their efforts to scale up and mainstream nature in sustainable urban development worldwide. ICLEI has also developed a dedicated website for local and subnational governments to advance the Action Agenda for Nature and People and the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework and holds monthly informational webinars. The CBC supports the work of CitiesWithNature.

ICLEI works with four Brazilian cities to develop an action plans to achieve emissions neutrality and climate resilience by 2050. This includes emissions inventories, scenario modeling, vulnerability analysis and adaptation actions, and the implementation of already consolidated tools, such as CIRIS (developed by C40).

ICLEI develops and showcases an integrated and comprehensive approach to address urban transport issues and promote sustainable built environment and urban mobility strategies. The project supports four Indian Smart Cities (Gwalior, Ludhiana , Udaipur and Visakhapatnam) by building the local government’s capacity by providing technical advisory to develop smart built environment action plans that focus on smart urban mobility and smart buildings which can feed into ongoing efforts of smart city missions. The deliverables of the project include assessment of existing urban transport scenario in the identified cities for each state and provide support for implementation of smart mobility projects.

ICLEI supports the Clean Energy Living Laboratories (CELLs) and the Project Management Office, especially on local government engagement. ICLEI works with demonstration cities to mainstream a local energy plan and assists the CELLs in developing a curriculum for an executive education program targeting policymakers and stakeholders and support advocacy activities.

ICLEI facilitates City-to-City Exchange activities, conducting workshops to capacitate selected demonstration cities, and linking the cities to possible funding sources. The workshops are aimed to help the demonstration cities in actualizing their local energy plans. ASEP-CELLs’ emphasis on advocating, educating and supporting evidence-based policies and programs is expected to improve the learning conditions and experiences among stakeholders and champions.

A group of students from Northeastern University has been studying Fortaleza’s current Climate Action Plan, its actions and goals, and how far they have advanced. They have also been studying American projects, policies and initiatives, in order to be able to explore how policies, technologies, and cultural differences in various countries have helped grow and implement sustainable efforts and to make comparisons between sustainable energy technologies and policies in US and Brazil, and Boston and Fortaleza. The Lab’s products will be a written proposal and a one page executive summary to the mayor summarizing suggestions and appointments, and an oral presentation.