SF Peak Oil Task Force releases report
March 17th, 2009 by Jim JustIn October 2008 San Francisco formed a Peak Oil Preparedness Task Force charged with assessing the impact of declining supplies and rising prices of fossil fuels and coming up with a plan to mitigate the ill effects. Now the Task Force has posted a working draft of its final report.
To avoid what the Task Force sees as “a much darker future,” the report makes more than 70 recommendations, including:
- Energy: conduct waste audit, develop diverse renewable wind, solar, & tidal energy plan, build smart grid, consider feed-in tariffs.
- Economy: source locally; revise tax policies (”progressive” business taxes, carbon tax, demand-sensitive parking fees, city vehicle tax, gasoline tax based on price floor), invest in infrastructure based on future viability (no “orphan” projects, invest in short-haul water freight, rail).
- Food security: buy local, create city Board of Agriculture, provide incentives to use vacant land available for food production, make city parks and golf courses available for garden plots, tax fast food to fund local food production, plant fruit & nut trees along streets, tear up concrete & plant street-side gardens, allow small-scale animal husbandry, create neighborhood compost centers.
- Transportation: impose congestion & parking charges; make intercity & regional public transit cheap, convenient, direct, reliable; build mixed-use neighborhoods, encourage telecommuting, make biking safe & convenient and establish bike-share program, promote car-free lifestyle & make it possible, switch freight from trucks to rail & water.
- Built environment: require all new buildings to be zero energy, retrofit existing buildings, include blower test in building inspections, require energy audit on sale or remodel, use solar assessment district to finance solar installations.
- Protecting vulnerable populations: Implement grow-your-own food program for low income families, eliminate all parking requirements for new residential construction & convert garage space to living space, provide discounted passes for public transit, implement bicycle & neighborhood electric vehicle plan, provide programs to reduce energy use for low-income families esp. renters, prepare rationing plan to allocate resources during shortages on per capita basis.
The task force is expected to finalize the report by today (Tuesday March 17) and then submit it to the Board of Supervisors.