Mayor Breed Unveils Plan To Power San Francisco Buildings With 100% Renewable Energy

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SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) -- San Francisco Mayor London Breed on Monday unveiled a plan to transition the city's largest private commercial buildings to 100 percent renewable electricity over the next decade. The move would bring the city closer to its goal of running entirely on renewable electricity by 2050.

According to the plan, the city's commercial buildings larger than 500,000 square feet would be required to run completely on renewable energy from any of the city's providers by 2022.

Then in 2024, that requirement would be extended to all commercial buildings in the city of over 250,000 square feet. By 2030, all the city's commercial buildings of more than 50,000 square feet would be required to run on all renewable energy.

"San Francisco has always been a national leader when it comes to sustainability, but we know that the reality of climate change requires us to go further," Breed said in a statement.

"Transitioning our large buildings to 100 percent renewable energy is an important step to continuing the progress we have made with CleanPowerSF towards making San Francisco an even more
sustainable city."

An ordinance with terms of the program is set to be introduced Tuesday during the Board of Supervisors' meeting. The program would be administered by the city's Department of Environment, in collaboration with the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.

Currently, the city's major electricity providers -- Hetch Hetchy Power, CleanPowerSF and PG&E -- all provide 100 percent renewable energy programs.

According to the mayor's office, the city's building sectors account for 44 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, while the transportation sector makes up 46 percent.

In addition to the ordinance, Breed also announced that she's directing the Department of Environment to put together a public-private task force to examine how best to electrify the city's buildings, both old and new. The task force is expected to produce an outline for decarbonizing buildings sometime in early 2020.