We recognise the real and increasing threat of climate change to our environment, health and wellbeing. We also recognise the threat to our quality of life now and into the future.

We have heard from our community that environmental sustainability, specifically climate change, is an important issue. Our Climate Action Plan outlines how we will respond to this challenge. It also explains how we will work with our community and other levels of government to tackle climate change.

We have already made big improvements, but we can keep building on these. We recognise the important global movement towards zero emissions and that the City of Boroondara should be part of this movement.

Climate change is about more than just greenhouse gas emissions. Even if all countries substantially reduce emissions now, it’s too late to avoid some long-term changes to our environment. We must prepare to adapt to a warmer climate that changes regularly and has more extreme weather events. This will impact on our people and biodiversity. It will affect how we travel, how we use water and how we live our lives.

Our vision is that everyone who lives, works and plays in Boroondara will come together to achieve our goals. We want to support and encourage the use of renewable energy and sustainable materials. We want to re-think the way we travel to use greener alternatives and we want to save our valuable drinking water. We want to make sure we use our valuable resources well and recycle as much as possible. We also want to make sure we are ready to adapt to new technologies that will help us achieve our goals.

We understand that we have an essential role in achieving this vision and tackling climate change. We will continue to lead and support our community to reduce emissions. We will work with other councils, governments, agencies and groups to find ways to reduce emissions. We will also strive to be a carbon neutral Council by 2022 and support our community to be carbon neutral by 2035.

We will report the outcomes of our Climate Action Plan each year. We will also review and update the Climate Action Plan in 5 years.