American cities working to protect the environment

By Asako Takahashi

New York City, Houston, Miami, and San Francisco are the three main cities in the United States that are leading the way towards more eco-friendly society. President Trump has made the decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate accord, which reflects America’s negative attitude towards environmental issues. Though, despite this movement as a nation, major cities in the country have started working to protect our planet. New York City At the household level, New York City focuses on improving recycling and composting system in order to have a better control over the waste that has been adding to the piles in landfills around the cities. They have invested fundings to make their energy system more efficient by installing solar panels on the rooftops and planting thousands of trees, and have promised to cut emissions by 80% by 2050. Houston Houston's strength comes from its focus on the renewable energy. Houston is the biggest municipal user of green power. They have installed solar and wind power which represents 89% of the entire electricity use of the city, according to the latest figure from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Miami Miami has been experiencing issues with the flood as a result of global warming. The city and people in the city are aware of the issue from their experience. Their effort is to get out of the issue first instead of changing habits to make the society to a more eco-friendly place. San Francisco "0-50-100-Roots" plan is a plan that San Francisco established which promise to reach zero waste by 2020, to promote sustainable transportation for local people, to use 100% renewable energy, and to protect the city's tree canopy. For the sustainable transportation methods in the city, they aim to increase the use of sustainable transportation use, which includes Uber, Lyft (reducing the car ownership of local residents), to 50% of all. They also install public transportation system that runs on biodiesel. Reference https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/06/the-fight-against-climate-change-four-cities-leading-the-way-in-the-trump-era/530385/





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