Data-based climate action at the local level

Local and regional climate action targets are often very ambitious. Rightly so, as this is the only way to achieve national and global climate goals. However, many local and regional governments face a key challenge. A lack of local data makes it difficult to accurately shape climate action measures. The Environmental Insights Explorer can offer much needed support, as the example of the Piedmont region shows.

Climate neutrality by 2050 – that is the declared goal of the Piedmont region. This region in northern Italy has set an ambitious target, which it hopes to achieve in part through measures in the transport sector. The lack of local data to facilitate sustainable transport planning poses a major hurdle to this endeavour. Missing information on the modal split and journey distances within urban areas, difficulties in assessing the impact of local measures for a sustainable transportation system and challenges in analysing the correlation between energy consumption and air quality in urban areas are among the issues that the region must tackle.

With Climate Alliance’s support, the regional administration is making use of Google's Environmental Insights Explorer (EIE) to confront these challenges head on. The tool is basically an improved version of Google Maps, providing in-depth information on energy consumption and emissions in the building and transport sectors as well as an overview of a municipality’s solar potential, a visualisation of its tree canopy density and more. Around 40,000 municipalities around the world are already using the tool; Climate Alliance has been offering it to its member municipalities free of charge since 2023.

Before the Piedmont region decided to introduce the tool, it conducted a consultation process with the support of Climate Alliance, inviting local stakeholders to assess both the EIE’s suitability for the development of sustainable climate and energy plans as well as the quality of the data it provides. The group of administrative staff and representatives from research institutes and universities agreed that the data would constitute a suitable basis for regional climate policy, particularly with regard to the transport use distribution, the evaluation of the success of specific measures and the analysis of emissions. The stakeholders also identified optimisation potential, pointing to the need for information on daily travel routes or traffic volumes.

"The Google Environmental Insights Explorer fills some informative gaps that local authorities have in data access. What is remarkable is that data is available for free and with a user friendly dashboard,” comments Silvio De Nigris, Policy Officer in the Piedmont Region's Sustainable Energy Department, on the tool.

Climate Alliance is currently supporting members as well as municipalities and regions from all over Europe in using the EIE.

Interested in the EIE for your municipality or region? Contact Miguel Morcillo at m.morcillo(at)climatealliance.org for more information.

_{Written in December 2024}