Why live lightly
The Reason for Change
New Zealand and the World
What Council is Doing
Home Performance Advice
Future Fit
Live lightly
If Auckland is to develop as a sustainable, resilient and liveable city today and into the future, then Auckland Council must lead the way. Council will reduce the impacts of its activities, engage and inform employees on living lightly and keep sustainability at the heart of decision making.
A new study shows that Auckland is producing more greenhouse gas emissions than ever. However, Auckland Council is taking action to reduce the city's carbon footprint. The economic, social and environmental success of Auckland requires an ambitious and accelerated reduction in emissions, as it prepares for the impacts of a changing climate.
Council's Low Carbon Strategic Action Plan was designed to take action on these challenges and opportunities. It aimed to reduce overall emissions by 40 per cent by 2040. The Low Carbon Strategic Action Plan is currently under review. To ensure that Auckland is prepared to adapt to a changing climate, as well as reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Auckland Council is leading the development of a new Auckland Climate Action Plan (ACAP).
Auckland's Mayor Phil Goff is committed to seeing the city help lead the charge for collective, cross-sector approach to climate change challenges. Council has been making changes to the way key services are delivered to Aucklanders, most notably in the areas of transport, urban development, waste minimisation and the planting of trees. Find out more about the Mayors plan to improve the city's living environment and offset Auckland's carbon emissions through a major tree planting initiative Million Trees.
Auckland Council collects and weighs all kitchen recyclables, food waste for commercial composting and waste to landfill. Labelled bins in every kitchen encourage staff to recycle or compost as much as possible.
Council has entered into a trial into with the Misprint Company to collect paper that has only been used on one side. The paper is repurposed into notebooks.
Several Council buildings have worm farms onsite and as much food waste as possible is composted. The worm castings and worm tea are given to community gardens and staff for use in their gardens.
Auckland Council staff travel across the region in order to engage with communities, work with partners and deliver key services. To minimise the impacts associated with this travel, council is taking a number of actions:
improving systems that reduce the requirement to travel, such as teleconferencing
investing in a range of low impact travel options for staff, including conventional and electric bicycles, and hybrid and electric vehicles.
Council is also providing better information to staff on alternative travel options, such as public transport.
Auckland Council owns and operates a number of offices, service centres, libraries, community centres, parks and swimming pools. Through on-going maintenance and the design and construction of new facilities, Council seeks to reduce the overall impact of these buildings by:
efficiently using energy, water, and other resources
protecting occupant health and improving employee productivity
reducing waste, pollution and environmental degradation
benchmarking corporate buildings through the NABERSNZ energy performance rating scheme, with four buildings achieving ratings of between 3 and 5 stars.
In April 2017, Auckland Council revised its Responsible Investment Policy, adding provisions to divest and exclude investments relating to the manufacture of controversial weapons, tobacco manufacture, gambling and fossil fuels.
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