The Sonoma County Sustainability Initiative has two broad objectives: establish the county as a landscape-scale laboratory to test greenhouse gas reduction strategies, and greatly reduce carbon emissions within the county. These are the working goals of the initiative:
- Adopt practices in agriculture, forestry, and land-use that will sequester carbon equal to half the county’s transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions.
- Measure the carbon footprint of all county wineries by 2010.
- Increase local food production.
- Establish reliable methods for measuring progress in emission reduction.
- Develop effective educational programs to support goals.
- Improve shipping strategies so more goods are delivered using less packaging and fuel.
- Create a county fleet of 5,000 plug-in hybrid or electric vehicles by 2012.
- Create a “zero net carbon” water supply by 2015.
- Reduce emissions from vineyard farm equipment 25 percent below 1990 levels by 2015, and 50 percent by 2030.
- Develop a decentralized network supplying at least 250 megawatts of renewable energy by 2030 (equivalent to half the electrical power currently consumed in the county).
- Restore 100 percent of the native riparian vegetation on county streams by 2030 to improve fish habitat.
