Carlsbad Planning Commission reviews draft Climate Action Plan amid business concerns over costs

Carlsbad — City staff on Sept. 4 presented the draft update to Carlsbad’s Climate Action Plan to the Planning Commission and outlined proposed greenhouse gas targets, proposed measures and outreach to date, while a string of public commenters urged either faster action or more analysis of private‑sector costs.

Katie Hentrich, the city’s Public Works senior program manager and climate action plan administrator, told commissioners the update uses a 2016 inventory of 981,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent and a sector breakdown that attributes about 51% of emissions to on‑road transportation, 27% to electricity and 14% to natural gas. She said the draft sets targets to cut emissions 50% below the 2016 baseline by 2035 and 85% by 2045 and noted the update was developed to align with state policy and a mitigation measure in the city’s supplemental environmental impact report that calls for a CAP update by early 2025.

Hentrich said the draft includes roughly 25 potential measures, 37 primary actions and 69 supporting actions (detailed in exhibit 1 of the staff report). The measures cover water and wastewater, energy, waste diversion, transportation, off‑road equipment and carbon sequestration; staff described an example measure template that lists projected GHG reductions, implementation timing, responsible departments, monitoring benchmarks and equity considerations. She described a new climate equity component and said staff is seeking grant funding to partner with community‑based organizations for a fuller equity analysis.

“Because our currently adopted climate action plan is several years old, there are a number of other improvements that can be made,” Hentrich said, adding that some measures would be voluntary incentives and pilots while others represent expanded or new policies that would return to decision‑making bodies for design and possible adoption.

Public response was mixed. Mike McMahan urged immediate action and called the staff measures “excellent,” while Linda Daniels of the Sierra Club and others described personal and community electrification efforts and promoted programs such as the Clean Energy Alliance’s “solar plus” offering.

Business groups were the most persistent critics. Craig Benedetto, representing a commercial real estate group, said owners and operators already invest heavily to meet state and local requirements and argued the city should wait for upcoming state building code updates before adopting additional local requirements. “Adding more requirements will only make running both commercial and residential space more difficult and more expensive,” Benedetto said in his remarks to the commission.

Melanie Woods, vice president of the California Apartment Association, said the draft lacks detail about how new goals would be achieved and masks potential costs to building owners and tenants; she urged a full cost analysis of private‑sector impacts and favored incentives over mandates. Paul Clukas, representing the Carlsbad Research Center Owners Association, said tenant improvement triggers (cited in the draft at a $200,000 threshold) could discourage needed building upgrades in large research‑park properties.

Diane Nygaard of Preserve Calavera urged stronger benchmarks and cautioned that the draft’s 2045 target was exceeded in the package by only about 6,000 metric tons — a relatively small margin compared with the city’s total emissions — and she urged the city to adopt early demonstration actions.

Commissioners spent the remainder of the item probing technical details and tradeoffs. Several asked whether carbon sequestration measures meant planting trees (staff: yes), and multiple commissioners urged more concrete cost information for private stakeholders. Hentrich said the staff team completed an implementation cost analysis that considered city operational costs for the first five years (an appendix to the draft) but did not scope a stakeholder benefit‑cost analysis to evaluate private‑sector costs; she said that broader analysis would require additional budget and direction from city council and estimated a realistic timeline of nine to 12 months to prepare a comprehensive stakeholder benefit‑cost study.

Commissioner comments repeatedly returned to a common theme: the city faces both a climate imperative and a housing and economic concern. “We have a climate crisis, but we also have a housing crisis,” Commissioner Stein said, urging caution and more data about the potential impacts on housing and private‑sector projects before adopting mandates.

Staff recommended the commission receive the report as an informational item and return on Oct. 2 when the commission is scheduled to make formal recommendations to city council. At that October meeting the commission will be asked to consider certifying an addendum to the housing element supplemental EIR for the CAP update and to recommend adoption of the plan itself, including whether to adopt the minimum required reduction target or to exceed it.

Hentrich said staff will continue outreach, will post additional materials and the public draft (already posted July 8), and will include public comments in exhibits to the staff report. A comprehensive stakeholder cost‑benefit analysis was not in the current scope or budget, she told the commission, but could be pursued if council directed funding and staff time.

The Planning Commission closed public testimony, discussed potential recommendation language and scheduling, and agreed to take the item up again in October; no formal commission action or votes on plan adoption occurred at the Sept. 4 meeting.