A touch of winter is seen in the form of fresh snowfall among the yellow aspen trees on Aspen Mountain on Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2023. Opening day, which is usually on Thanksgiving Day, remains a ways off, but it’s an exciting start to the season. Austin Colbert/The Aspen Times
Once known only for mining, Aspen now sits at the forefront of environmental sustainability for mountain towns in the West.
In the past week, 2024 Green Destinations, an organization that helps destinations become more sustainable, and Mountain Towns 2030, a climate accelerator for mountain and outdoor communities, recognized the city of Aspen for its ongoing work to achieve environmental progress.
Aspen Mayor Torre said he thinks the recognition will help the city enact more change.
“The recognition is wonderful,” Torre said. “And that recognition leads to spreading these values and spreading these goals and sharing the information that we have with others.”
The 2024 Green Destinations included Aspen in their “Top 100 Stories List” for their ongoing commitment to mitigate climate change. They credited Aspen’s holistic approach to tackling climate change, focusing specifically on four initiatives made by the city.
The initiatives include their organic waste diversion policy, making it unlawful to dispose of organic materials in the landfill, and the Colorado Green Business Network of Aspen, providing assistance and recognition to businesses that use sustainable practices.
Aspen also implemented the Building IQ initiative, which requires owners of large commercial and multi-family buildings to track energy and water usage and a strategy to construct more public charging stations for electric vehicles.
Eliza Voss, vice president of Destination Marketing for the Aspen Chamber Resort Association (ACRA), said the achievements will help them set future goals.
“Aspen has long been always pushing the envelope,” Voss said. “So we love the recognition and the certification, but I think it also helps us have a benchmark of — where can we go from here?”
She said ACRA worked with Aspen to create the Colorado Green Businesses Network of Aspen. Overall, she attributed much of the city’s environmental success to the work done by Aspen’s Environmental Health and Sustainability Team.
Mountain Towns 2030 also acknowledged Aspen’s sustainability work, hosting their inaugural award ceremony to recognize municipalities paving the way with climate action. The city of Aspen won the “Community of the Year” award for their electrification initiatives — their work to operate public and private infrastructure with electricity and support it with renewable energy.
The city earned the award through a collaborative, multi-department process, said Clare McLaughlin, Aspen Environmental Health and Sustainability Team Administrator.
“You have a full city cross-departmental effort that has realized all these different policies and projects,” McLaughlin said.
Specifically, Mountain Towns 2030 recognized Aspen’s initiatives to create public electric vehicle infrastructure, and their efforts to manage the energy usage by public and private buildings.
To move toward vehicle electrification, she said they are constructing public electric vehicle charging stations and are working with the police department to replace some of the gas-powered cruisers with Teslas.
Addressing building efficiency is one of the city’s major goals, as they strive to emit zero emissions by 2050, she said.
The city adopted a Building IQ initiative to address emissions from existing buildings in Aspen. The initiative requires owners of commercial properties of over 10,000 square feet and owners of multifamily properties of over 20,000 square feet to track their water and energy usage.
McLaughlin said tracking these metrics is important so building owners know what they need to improve upon.
“In the building world, if you don’t have that information, you can’t really make improvements because you wouldn’t know how things were going in the first place,” she said.
Implemented in 2022, they’ve already tracked water and energy usage for 36% of total square footage of Aspen buildings. Phase two of the project will require owners to meet certain efficiency standards set by the city.
Affordable housing complexes are also working to go electric, she said.
Aspen’s electrification success comes down to the collaborative effort by the Capital Assets, Transportation, Streets, Community Development, and police departments, as well as the Aspen-Pitkin County Housing Authority, she added.
She also acknowledged the work done by the two utility groups, Aspen Electric and Holy Cross Energy, regarding the city electrification. Electricity produced by Aspen Electric is completely supported by renewable energy. Holy Cross committed to transitioning to renewable energy by 2030.
“We’re a community that cares about the health and well being of not only our friends and family and community,” McLaughlin said. “But (about) these beautiful natural spaces that we get to play and live and be together in.”