10 Cities Taking Action on Climate

By the Bloomberg Philanthropies Environment Team

Which cities are leading the way on climate change reporting?

The answer is a little bit clearer thanks to the recent work of CDP and C40 — two organizations funded by Bloomberg Philanthropies.  CDP is the largest global reporting platform for cities.  The program is open to any city government, regardless of size or geographic location.

Reporting is the first step to managing emissions and taking action to reduce them — and is also the cornerstone of a new global effort to celebrate and track the progress of voluntary city action, the global Compact of Mayors. This week, CDP released ten InFocus Reports to top performing city governments. The reports reward cities that demonstrate the strongest commitment to annual climate change reporting.  More than 200 cities — including 90% of C40 cities — report annually on their climate activity through CDP’s reporting system.  CDP evaluates these cities’ responses for completeness and quality of response.  The highest scoring cities receive an InFocus Report.

Bloomberg Philanthropies would like to congratulate the following cities for leading the way on climate reporting:

• • Cleveland
  • Las Vegas
  • Edmonton
  • Paris
  • Cascais
  • Johannesburg
  • Venice
  • Goiânia
  • Yokohama
  • Sydney

The list represents a wide geographic spread, with at least one city from every continent reporting.  Some of these cities, like Edmonton and Cascais, were first-time responders in 2014.  Other cities, like Sydney and Yokohama, have been demonstrating reporting excellence for many years.  Five out of the ten are part of C40’s network of leadership cities.

Cities can use these reports in a variety of ways.  Buenos Aires, which received an InFocus report in 2013 for its stellar climate change reporting, notes that the reports are a great way to engage other stakeholders in the city.  “It was good for us as a tool to remind our own authorities as well as other departments the importance of participating in CDP,” writes the city.

Additionally, cities can distribute these reports to potential funders or even post on the city government website to provide a readable summary of the city’s recent work on climate.