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The Los Altos City Council is now considering building electrification Reach Codes. These upgrades to the California state building codes are important for the future of our health, our families and our planet. The topic is complicated and there is lots of misinformation. We need your help to get the Reach Code passed. Please read why we support Reach Codes and how you can show your support below. You can also visit the City of Los Altos’ Information Page on Reach Codes. Why we support Reach Codes Reach Codes help our community meet its climate goals. Reach Codes mean healthier buildings. Reach Codes result in buildings that cost less and work great! Reach Codes have lots of support. We’re in good company! How you can support Reach Codes and a better future We encourage you to take the following steps to let the City Council know that you support their efforts to protect Los Altos families and reduce carbon emissions for future generations. Complete the City survey here before May 30th to show you are in favor of Reach Codes. Write to City Council at council@losaltosca.gov by Friday, May 8 to express your support for Reach Codes. A sample letter is below. Attend one or more of the following important meetings and voice your support (details for watching and submitting comments at these live meetings will be on the City’s website a few days before the actual meetings): May 11 – Environmental Commission – 7pm May 12 – City Council – 7pm June 1 – City Council – 7pm Write a Letter to the Editor to the Los Altos Town Crier (200 word maximum). Email bruceb@latc.com. Questions? Feel free to contact us at info@greentownlosaltos.org. Want more details? Read more here…. Reach Codes help our community meet its climate goals. Buildings are the second largest source of Los Altos’ greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) and most of those emissions come from natural gas. Shifting from natural gas to electric will reduce our community’s carbon emissions, especially since our power provider, SVCE delivers 100% carbon-free electricity. The proposed Reach Codes apply only to new construction – about 40 homes per year. To capture the significant GHG reduction potential in existing homes, GreenTown would like to see the Council also address fossil fuel use in major remodels and additions. Reach Codes mean healthier buildings. All electric buildings are far healthier than buildings with gas appliances (see story by Donna Staton, MD on our Board). They eliminate gas combustion by-products, like carbon monoxide, resulting in healthier indoor air for our families and reduce the risk of a San Bruno-type disaster. Reach Codes result in buildings that cost less and work great! California Energy Commission (CEC) found that an all-electric reach code for new construction is cost-effective in our area. Furthermore, natural gas transmission costs continue to increase as natural gas use declines from its peak usage in 2012. Electric appliances and equipment for water heating, space heating, laundry and cooking, required by Reach Codes, are proven technologies that are highly efficient and work great. Even celebrity chefs, like Thomas Keller of The French Laundry and Wolfgang Puck of Spago, use induction cooktops. They are safer, healthier, more efficient and heat up faster than gas cooktops! Reach Codes have lots of support. We’re in good company! More than 30 Bay area cities are committed to Reach Codes, including nearby neighbors in Palo Alto, Mountain View, Los Altos Hills, Los Gatos, San Jose, Saratoga and Cupertino. See the list of Santa Clara County cities. Environmental groups, in addition to GreenTown, including Los Altos Youth Climate Action Team, Los Altos High School Green Team, Sierra Club, Mothers-Out-Front, 350SV, and Acterra, all support Reach Codes. Here’s the sample letter to email to council@losaltosca.gov : SUBJECT: I Support Reach Codes Honorable Members of the Council, Thank you for your leadership in advancing building electrification Reach Codes for Los Altos. I support Reach Codes for the following reasons: 1) Reach Codes support our community’s climate goals. They will reduce Los Altos’ carbon footprint from buildings – the second largest contributor to our community’s greenhouse gas emissions – because unlike natural gas, our electricity from SVCE, is 100% carbon-free. 2) Reach Codes will result in healthier buildings. They reduce gas combustion by-products providing healthier indoor air for our families and reduce our community’s risk of a San Bruno-type disaster. 3) Reach Codes save money. The CEC has demonstrated that Reach Codes are cost-effective for consumers, so homeowners in our community will realize energy and cost-savings from all-electric homes. Thank you for your efforts to protect the health and well-being of our community and our planet. Please vote for Reach Codes when they come before the Council. Sincerely, (Your name)

The school closures put a stop to planting them in March as we’d planned. The poor trees sat in their containers at Gary’s house, dejected but getting regular watering, while we hoped for an early opening of the school campus. Our hopes were dashed when it was announced that the school would remain closed until next fall. Then, the very next day, we were happily surprised. An inquiry from Ventano preschool arrived! The preschool is located on the grounds of Christ Episcopal Church on Border Road. They had recently lost two redwood trees, noticed that GreenTown Los Altos was planting trees and said they would like two large trees as replacements. Specifically, they would like two cedar trees. I haveto say that gave me a little bit of a tingle. Montclaire school gave up the trees and the very next day, Ventano wanted them.  It must be divine intervention. Maybe, maybe not, we planted the trees and they look beautiful.

Interested in knowing how what you eat impacts the environment? Find out the size of your foodprint by watching this video and taking this quiz from Foodprint.org Then try these on for size for some ways to reduce it! The Joyful Vegan’s cooking classes. The Joyful Vegan, who GreenTown hosted in Jan. 14th continues to offer online cooking classes. The next one is June 7, 2020 at noon. She’ll be featuring a Mexican menu: sweet potato tacos, peach salsa and horchata. Yum! Register here! Let’s talk yogurt. The Minimalist Baker has tips and tricks for making coconut yogurt including the best brands of coconut milk and probiotics to use! View her video here. GreenTown’s Isabelle Cnudde who also started Clorofil, a local animal microsanctuary, has been using quarantine to teach folks some plant-based recipes including a yogurt made with cashews and soy milk. You can see her cooking videos here. Podcast for the planet. Climate One’s podcast – Rewind: Fate of Food/Plate to Planet –  examines the question: “How can we continue to feed a crowded planet without destroying it in the process?” Host Greg Dalton interviews authors Anne Lappe and Mark Kurlansky here. Questions? Email info@GreenTownLosAltos.org.

Hold the plastic bag! During this pandemic season, we’ve seen an uptick in the amount of plastic waste — from groceries disallowing reusable shopping bags to copious take-out from restaurants. And while things are changing as our county opens up and loosens restrictions, we must remain vigilant in doing our part to reduce plastic waste! Eric Wolff  (see photo) did his part by packing his groceries directly in his cart and wheeling it out to the parking lot where he transferred his groceries to reusable bags in the back of his car. We’ve heard the same from Los Altos residents Maureen Griffith and Linda Gass. They are doing their part to manage their plastic waste even in the worst of the pandemic! This month is Plastic Free July, a global movement started in Australia in 2011 to help everyday citizens be part of the solution to plastic pollution – for cleaner oceans and more beautiful communities! Won’t you take a first step and join the Plastic Free July challenge by choosing to refuse single-use plastics for the month of July?

Acterra’s Electric Vehicle (EV) workshop on June 9th provided a wealth of information to help you get started on the your journey to go electric! With so many EVs available, their driving ranges improving, ownership and operating costs at or below gas-powered vehicles and significant environmental benefits, more than ever it’s a no-brainer to “go EV” with your next car purchase! The workshop presented all the key information you’ll need to make the transition to an electric vehicle: What is an EV and why drive and EV? What are the environmental and health benefits of switching to EVs? What are some other the benefits of an EV? What is the cost-of-ownership advantages of an EV and how does it compare to a gas powered car? How to charge your EV? What charging infrastructure is available? What vehicles are available and what is coming soon? What incentives are available to buy an EV? Watch the recording of the Clean Air, Blue Skys. Drive Electric Video presentation and head over to Acterra’s EV resources page for great information including the latest lease deals! Resources: Federal Tax Credit – Scroll down for step-by-step instructions on completing the tax form. General Motors brands and Tesla models no longer qualify for this credit. California State Rebate PG&E Clean Fuel Rebate Rebate Finder Tool from Plugstar – Discover all the rebates and perks available in your area. EV Finder Tools from Sierra Club and PG&E Weekly list of EV lease deals – Make sure your lease term is for at least 30 months in order to qualify for the $2000 California state rebate. Used EVs: The following Bay Area dealerships carry previously-owned EVs: Green Light Auto Wholesale (Daly City) Rose Motors (Castro Valley) Driven-EV.com (Livermore) Skye Auto (Fremont) Barocci Motor Group (Teslas only, Richmond)

After the Los Altos Crier posted a story with some inaccuracies about Reach Codes, GreenTown Los Altos’s Gary Hedden stepped up to write a letter explaining our position. We thought it was worthy of posting so others get the info. “Hello Bruce, I was taken aback by the page five story on reach codes. The bright red banner proclaiming 74.3% oppose reach codes was both dramatically eye catching and dramatically misleading. I attended the June Environmental Commission meeting when more recent survey results were discussed, and although there was opposition to the proposed reach codes, it was not even the majority view. There was actually pretty strong support for some flavor of expanded reach codes. Here is a screen shot of the relevant survey results. The survey allowed for multiple entries, making it hard to interpret, but the “no” vote is 27.3%, not 74.3%, a number that came from an earlier and very different survey. I hope you will offer an explanation in next week’s newspaper. That wide variability in survey results also deserves some comment. A speaker named Lam at the Chamber of Commerce meeting Wednesday mentioned that a lot of comments are showing up on Nextdoor, and I got the impression that he follows it fairly closely. Nextdoor is a terrible source of information however. It is easily and often manipulated. Lam called for an election to let people decide on reach codes. Chris Jordan wisely pointed out that special elections are expensive, so let the council do their job. If people are getting their news from Nextdoor because they don’t trust the city council, or the Environmental Commission, or even the Town Crier, heaven forbid, then I can see why there is such a wide split in the community on this issue (and so many others). You might also explore why there is such strong opposition to the gas ban in the first place. There is an anti-science part of the population that doesn’t believe in the risk of climate change. Some of these folks probably don’t believe in the medical science that would have everyone wearing a face mask. This is often wrapped up in the frustration called government overreach. I am always curious about that, what overreach should we take away? The Libertarian Party would abolish the income tax for example, but getting back to reach codes, would these folks abolish Title 24? It has been around since 1978 and the building efficiency created by it has saved Californians a lot of money on their energy bills over the years. Also worth exploring, a lot of folks don’t realize that there have been huge improvements in electric appliances over the years. We now have induction cooktops that are easier to control than gas, and cleaner. We have heat pump technology that is super efficient and cost effective over the long haul. The panel discussion by LAR got into this with Tom Kabot presenting the case for reach codes. The two opponents did not have a good answer for him and talked about other things. My two cents, Gary Hedden"

Fires, fires, everywhere. And lately, they’re hitting closer to home which has made us all more appreciative of clean air. (Learn more about the link between climate change and air quality here). So what do you need to know to keep you and your family safe? Read more here. The most important aspect of air quality during the pandemic is fine particulate matter, e.g., PM 2.5 (particulate matter of 2.5 microns or smaller). These particles have been associated with increased risk of death from coronavirus (Harvard Univ., April 2020) and can penetrate deep into the lungs and even impact cardiovascular health, so you want to minimize your exposure. The best way to do that is to: (i) know what your air quality is (and it changes frequently these days), (ii) clean it up if it’s not up to snuff, and (iii) know where you can go for better air. Tricky during these times, for sure. Figure out your air quality CalFire – to learn where the fires are and their level of containment. The PG&E Fire Detection Satellite Map is an excellent map, too, but takes a while to load so only use it if you have patience! AirNow and PurpleAir – to discover air quality in your area. AirNow tends to be more accurate but with fewer local sensors. PurpleAir’s sensors are simpler and more abundant but weren’t really designed to measure particles from wood smoke. However, you can select a correction factor on PurpleAir to more accurately reflect current air quality. (This article explains discrepancies between AirNow and PurpleAir and how to adjust PurpleAir to get a more accurate and more local AQI). If you read that last bit, you’re already a real data geek, so you may want to: Check out Windy to see which way the wind is blowing and help you predict what your air will be like tomorrow; and Measure your own air quality with a portable air quality monitoring device. Some are reviewed here. We use the Temtop M2000C love it! Clean up your air C|NET did a recent review of some good air purifiers. We love our Honeywell and also have a quieter, lower profile Medify that we like. And if your power goes out, get out of Dodge (well, not really) But seriously, most newer cars have excellent air filtration. Close the windows and choose “recirculation” on the ventilation system and see and feel the air quality improve. Or better yet, measure it. We’ve seen PM 2.5 go from unhealthy to healthy in no time! Backup power can help, too, though we haven’t looked deeply enough into this to provide a solid recommendation. If you’ve done the research, let us know your thoughts here.

by Wendy Tanz Nil Zacharias, co-founder of One Green Planet and weekly podcast #eatfortheplanet, explained to a full-house the dangers of continuing to grow and process animals for food. Our water, land and air are all being destroyed by the animal food-based industry. We’re pushing our planetary boundaries! The advent of the Industrial Revolution and the rise of population and technology helped create the unchecked capitalism of today. More. Faster. We’re extracting our resources faster than these resources can replenish themselves. Sonar technology is now used to locate fish, not fishermen. Cows are kept lactating by constant artificial insemination. Cattle are fed only the food that will make them huge until their legs can’t hold them. More animals, grown fast, in small spaces. Treated with antibiotics and cut out the visible infections. Ready for the market, big and fast! Twenty-three percent (23%) of our water goes to animals while people go without water. More than fifty percent (50%) of our land is used for our food animals, land that could grow food. Trees absorb our greenhouse emissions, but our forests are being removed to provide more land to grow more animals that will need more water to clean, hydrate and grow more food for these animals. It’s a wasteful growing cycle. For context, it takes 2,000 gallons of water to produce 1 gallon of milk. When consumed by food animals, what do 100 calories of grain provide? 40 calories of milk; 12 calories of chicken; or 3 calories of beef. Those same grains could be directly feeding people instead! And, don’t forget…where there’s life, there’s poop! Three hundred and sixty nine tons (369) annually, releasing more gases into the air than the entire transportation sector,  and funneled into our waterways heating our waters, killing our coral reefs, ultimately destroying the balance of our ocean waters, turning our oceans into poop. The good news: Today many investors and meat companies are getting into the plant-based industry, the necessary wave of the future.  Billions are being invested. If consumers don’t buy animal products, the animal business will have to change! Mr. Zacharias points to what we can do NOW: Start somewhere….Cut your carbon footprint in half. Buy local. Organic. Eat vegan 1 day a week, the weekend, only at home…JUST START! Oh, and read Eat for the Planet, by Nil Zacharias. He explains it well!

~by Margie Suozzo I had the great pleasure of meeting Jo, our new intern, in early October. She will be working with the Waste Reduction and Pollution Prevention Team for 4, 2-week blocks throughout the school year. She just finished her first block and was excited to get going. Jo shares a bit of her story of the factors that contributed to her passion for protecting the environment: Well, we’re happy you did Jo. Our first two weeks were a rousing success! The Waste Reduction Team looks forward to working together the rest of the year!

Please join GreenTown in welcoming the following three new board members. Connie Miller As a Bay Area native and Los Altos resident who has spent her entire life enjoying the abundance of nature our region offers, Connie sees the urgent need to act boldly to create a sustainable and thriving environment for our children. All actions start with one person and grow into a collective wave of change. Connie believes Los Altos and Los Altos Hills are perfectly poised, with their educated residents, affluence and regional influence, to be the leaders of change and leave a lasting positive legacy for our planet. Through GreenTown Los Altos programs, education and policy influence, Connie hopes to be a resource for and inspire positive environmental change in others. Donna Staton Donna Staton is a semi-retired pediatrician, now working in global child health. She moved to the Bay Area a few years ago and lives in Los Altos Hills with her husband. With a background in environmental science as well as medicine, she hopes to get involved in advocacy work focused on reducing the production and use of plastics due to their negative environmental and health effects. Suresh Venkatraman Suresh’s daughters’ engagement in environmental causes were a major influence to join GreenTown. Youth all over the world are asking us, the current stewards, to do everything we can to reverse our effect on the planet’s environments and climate. Actions by individuals, communities, and governments must all come together to accomplish this monumental but achievable task. Suresh is passionate that we become acutely conscious of our consumption – from energy to products, from how they are manufactured, packaged to how they are disposed of – and make decisions and take actions to minimize our footprint. After working for many years in Silicon Valley’s high-tech industry, Suresh looks forward to being on the board and exploring how technology can be better used in the green world.

Rising star environmental advocates, Addy Kopp, Ezri Rohatgi and Mia Ravishankar were sixth graders at Loyola, concerned about the environment and wanted to do something about it. Out of this concern they formed a club called Nature and Conservation for Kids (NACK). Now, at Blach in 7th grade, they recently addressed both the Los Altos School District Board (LASD) and the Los Altos City Council to ask for help to protect the health of students by reducing health harming toxics from unnecessary vehicle idling. Cars Are A Pollution Disaster Addy told the School Board and Council that vehicle exhaust contains toxins that can cause heart and lung diseases (especially asthma) and cancer. Children breathe faster than adults so are especially susceptible to these toxins. One recent study showed that between 2010 and 2015, about four million children in 194 countries developed asthma each year due to exposure to nitrogen dioxide (NO2) air pollution the main pollutant from vehicle exhaust.  As for C02, if everyone in the U.S. stopped idling for five minutes a day it would be equivalent to taking five hundred thousand cars off the road and saving 1.6 Million tons of CO2. Mia described how idling wastes a lot of gas and money. In fact, in California vehicles idling while parked emit roughly three million tons of carbon dioxide a year and burn roughly 300 million gallons of fuel. At $3.50 per gallon that’s over $1 billion and a lot of wasted money. And newer cars do not need to idle. She said the EPA found “hot spots” of toxins around schools at pick up time and discussed a program that the EPA developed to help schools reduce idling. Los Altos High School implemented much of the program last year and found idling was reduced 80%. Getting Started With A Mini-Campaign Ezri said that while the full program implementation would be great, it is a considerable effort.  Consequently, they proposed a mini-campaign that they believe will be effective with minimal effort. They asked for signs and communications. The signs should be installed where parents tend to idle while waiting for their students, namely pick-up areas, parking lots, and public streets leading to the pick-up areas. Ezri also asked City Council to install signs on Main and State Streets and in City parking lots. She said, “This would help not only children visiting public areas but people of all ages.  Think of diners sitting at a sidewalk cafe, coffee drinkers at Peet’s, Starbucks or Redberry, and children eating at TinPot or Baskin and Robbins ice cream while cars spew pollutants right beside them. This can seriously impact people’s health.” Communications to educate Los Altos residents about idling through normal channels such as school administration and City newsletters would also be helpful. The LASD School Board put anti-idling on the Oct 28th agenda and NACK was there to present a solution to make it easy for the district to implement a mini-campaign. They provided the district a sign design, sample newsletters along with letters to parents. The School Board directed the Superintendent to pursue implementation of their plan. The City already has a supply of signs from an initial installation last year and GreenTown is offering to pay for additional signs as well as the signs for the LASD. NACK was well received by both the School Board and City Council. In fact, the audience members at the City Council and School Board meetings applauded them upon completion of their talk.

~by Gary Hedden Bruce Nilles lives in Oakland and he listens to the teenagers who tell us we don’t have 30 years to solve the climate change crisis. Then he looks around and he realizes that his biggest greenhouse gas contribution comes from his own house! Bruce Nilles speaking about the electrification of homes It’s his appliances, his furnace, and his hot water heater. But the good news is he realizes he can fix all of that, and we don’t need the federal or state government to do it for us. We can do it ourselves locally and the technology does not have to be invented. All-electric is the answer and the sooner the better. Bruce is the Director of Building Electrification with the Rocky Mountain Institute, so he knows something about making the switch from gas to all-electric, but we aren’t making the switch fast enough. At the recent Electrification Expo in Palo Alto, he told us we are adding new gas customers every day, every hour. We are going in the wrong direction. Natural gas is 90% methane, a potent GHG, and half of the ‘use’ is from leaks. Leaks at the wellhead, leaks in the lines and leaks in the homes where we live. That is bad enough but there are health risks from burning it. The stove in your kitchen produces NOx when gas burns and the levels in homes have been measured at 400 ppb. That sounds small but the EPA recommends that it not exceed 100 ppb. That matters to our children. The asthma levels for children in homes with natural gas vs. children in all-electric homes is 42% higher. Bruce Nilles with a map showing patterns of fuel use in the US Your gas oven and gas cooktop are bad for the planet and bad for us. Some cities like Berkeley, San Jose, Menlo Park are banning new hookups with natural gas. They are practicing local control. My final point is that the ban should be a complete ban. A hybrid model that allows some use of natural gas slows down the switch. Once our code requires all-electric for new construction, architects, designers, builders, and city staff will adapt, make it work and the change will become easier. Many parts of the country are already largely all-electric, so we know it can be done. Retrofits will be difficult and expensive, but we can and should start making the switch with new construction.