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Location California, USA

This page is the beginnings of a portal for California community action. The majority of our information about this is collated via our place pages...Near you. Most of this page focuses on California community action topics. Separate pages cover California community action resources and California news

California is a state on the west coast of the United States, known for its relatively progressive policies on sustainability and support of renewable energy, as well as its natural beauty, including redwood forests.

California topic articles[edit | edit source]

Climate action[edit | edit source]

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The Cool Block—A Deeper Dive
Authors: Empowerment Institute, 2016

Resources

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CoolCalifornia.org is a website for Californians with resources to help them reduce their impact on the environment and combat climate change. The website is geared towards different audiences, including: individuals, small businesses, local government, youth, community organizations, and schools. The website currently features two carbon footprint calculators. One is for individuals and households and one is for small businesses; a similar tool for local governments is under development.

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California has taken a number of legislative steps and extensive measures and initiatives targeted at the broader issue of climate effects seeking to prevent and minimize the risks of possible effects of climate change by a wide variety of incentives, measures and comprehensive plans for clean cars, renewable energy, and pollution controls on industry with overall high environmental standards. California is internationally known for its leading role in the realm of ecoconscious legislature not just on a national level but also globally.

Community involvement[edit | edit source]

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Participatory Budgeting Vallejo

Community energy[edit | edit source]

Solar power in California[edit | edit source]

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Solar power has been growing rapidly in the U.S. state of California because of high insolation, community support, declining solar costs, and a renewable portfolio standard which requires that 60% of California's electricity come from renewable resources by 2030, with 100% by 2045. Much of this is expected to come from solar power via photovoltaic facilities or concentrated solar power facilities.

At the end of 2023, California had a total of 46,874 MW of solar capacity installed, enough to power 13.9 million homes in the state. California ranked as the highest solar power generating state in the nation, with solar power providing for 28% of the state's electricity generation. 63% of solar generation was produced by utility-scale solar farms, with the other 37% produced by distributed generation. The Solar Energy Industries Association predicts that California will increase its solar capacity by over 20,000 MW over the next five years, the second highest increase in solar capacity in the country behind Texas at 41,000 MW.

The state government has created various programs to incentivize and subsidize solar installations, including an exemption from property tax, cash incentives, net metering, streamlined permitting for residential solar, and, in 2020, requiring all new homes have solar panels.

Wind power in California[edit | edit source]

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Wind power in California had initiative and early development during Governor Jerry Brown's first two terms in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The state's wind power capacity has grown by nearly 350% since 2001, when it was less than 1,700 MW. In 2016, wind energy (including that supplied by other states) supplied about 6.9% of California's total electricity needs, or enough to power more than 1.3 million households. Most of California's wind generation is found in the Tehachapi area of Kern County, California, with some large projects in Solano, Contra Costa and Riverside counties as well. California is among the states with the largest amount of installed wind power capacity. In recent years, California has lagged behind other states when it comes to the installation of wind power. It was ranked 4th overall for wind power electrical generation at the end of 2016 behind Texas, Iowa, and Oklahoma. As of 2019, California had 5,973 megawatts (MW) of wind power generating capacity installed.

Cycling activism[edit | edit source]

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Advocacy Academy - Lessons From the Best Biking Cities - San Luis Obispo, CA.
Authors: PeopleForBikes, Nov 17, 2020
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Streetfilms-Bike Boulevards (Berkeley, CA)
Authors: StreetfilmsVlog

Food activism[edit | edit source]

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Lunch at the Library, free meals and learning opportunties added 16:04, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

See also: Urban agriculture in California, Category:Locally Delicious

Altadena Community Garden - Bay Area Seed Interchange Library (BASIL) - Benicia Community Gardens - Food Commons Fresno - Harvest Club of Orange County - Homeless Garden Project, Santa Cruz - OC Food Access Coalition

Localism[edit | edit source]

Fibershed, Local fibres, local dyes, local labor - Willits Economic Localization

Reduce, reuse, repair and recycle[edit | edit source]

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Californians Against Waste - Repair Café Palo Alto

  • Wikipedia:City of Oakland's Zero Waste Program: The City adopted a Zero Waste Strategic Plan in 2006, detailing a road map for the City to follow toward the implementation of a Zero Waste System by 2020. Oakland residents have played an important role in moving the City toward Zero Waste. Using their buying-power, consumers can tell industries that products must be non-toxic, reusable, recyclable or compostable or they will stay on the shelf.

Sharing[edit | edit source]

Toy Cycle, Platform for Families to Swap Toys

Social inclusion[edit | edit source]

Santa Cruz Warming Shelter Program

Sustainable transport activism[edit | edit source]

High Speed Rail[edit | edit source]

The California High-Speed Rail Authority was created in 1996 by the state to implement an extensive 700 mile (1127 km) rail system. It would provide a TGV-style high-speed link between the state's four major metropolitan areas, and would allow travel between Los Angeles' Union Station and the San Francisco Transbay Terminal in two and a half hours. Voters approved Proposition 1A in November 2008, approving a $9 billion state bond to finance the project. Then in 2012, the California legislature and Governor Jerry Brown approved construction financing for an initial stage of the project. However, the High Speed Rail Authority still estimates that the initial stages will not be completed until 2021. W

Plug-in electric vehicles in California[edit | edit source]

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The stock of plug-in electric vehicles in California is the largest in the United States, and as of December 2023, cumulative plug-in car registrations in the state since 2010 totaled 1.77 million units. Between November 2016 and until 2020, China was the only country market that exceeded California in terms of cumulative plug-in electric car sales.

Hiking trails[edit | edit source]

Towards sustainable economies[edit | edit source]

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As part of a privately funded experiment in Universal Basic Income in 2019, the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration (S.E.E.D.) conducted a pilot project that gave a $500 stipend to 125 randomly selected residents for an 24-month period with “no strings attached." It was made possible by the Economic Security Project, an advocacy group chaired by Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, which provided the first $1 million for the program, and a dozen other Silicon Valley organizations and private donors who funded the rest of its $3 million budget. The positive benefits of the program during the first year were described in an interim report published in March 2021.

Urban sustainability[edit | edit source]

Adapt Oakland

Campaigns[edit | edit source]

Californians Against Fracking on facebook

Near you[edit | edit source]

Los Angeles - Long Beach - San Diego - San Francisco

See also[edit | edit source]

Back to top

External links[edit | edit source]

References[edit | edit source]


FA info icon.svg Angle down icon.svg Page data
Keywords us states, participatory budgeting, community garden, repair cafe, basic income
Authors Phil Green
License CC-BY-SA-3.0
Language English (en)
Related 0 subpages, 99 pages link here
Aliases California
Impact 834 page views
Created November 18, 2011 by Chris Watkins
Modified July 12, 2023 by Felipe Schenone
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