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Bay Area Regional Climate Action Plan

Welcome to the Bay Area Regional Climate Action Plan (BARCAP)

This is an opportunity for the Bay Area-wide community to provide feedback on the Bay Area Regional Climate Action Plan (BARCAP) from July 2nd to July 29th, 2025. The BARCAP is a regional-level plan to move the Bay Area towards carbon neutrality, developed with support from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Climate Pollution Reduction Grant (CPRG) program.

Below, you can view the draft BARCAP, including the goals, measures and actions of the five focus areas of the plan. The Draft BARCAP measures will be available in Traditional Chinese and Spanish by July 9th, 2025.

Please share your feedback!

We want to hear your comments, questions, and suggestions! Read through the draft document in the window below and provide your input!

Click anywhere in the document (in the window below the green bar below) to tell us what you think of the draft measures, including what you like about them, what you recommend be changed and why, or who you think would be critical to support effective and equitable implementation.
- After clicking in the document, follow the prompts to leave a comment or a question. By commenting, you are accepting the website's Terms & Conditions and the Air District's Privacy Policy below.
- Adding your name and email address is preferred but not required.
- Use the Summary button at the bottom of the window to navigate to the BARCAP overview page or a specific sector. Use the Full Document button to see the entire list of measures and actions together.
Providing additional information or explanations, and/or links to references or reports to support your suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Air District Personally Identifiable Information Collection Notice

The Bay Area Air District hereby provides notice of the potential collection of personal information through these forms, as required under the Information Practices Act. The Planning and Climate Protection Division of the Air District is collecting this information under the California Health & Safety Code §§ 40000; 40004; and 40701. This information will be used for the purpose of communicating with you if any clarification, question or response to your comment(s) is necessary. The submission of this information is voluntary and, if the information is not disclosed, Air District staff may not be able to contact you with any follow-up questions or responses. The responsible agency official for this information is John Chiladakis, Chief Technology Officer (415-749-4750) and members of the public may request access to this data by contacting the responsible official.

Summary Full Document

Summary

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BARCAP Measures Summary

This summary section provides a high level summary of each focus area. Select a focus area to read the draft measures.

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What is the BARCAP?

PLEASE READ ME FIRST - This section introduces the Bay Area Regional Climate Action Plan (BARCAP) and the process used to create the draft measures presented in this document.

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Buildings

The commercial and residential sector of the Bay Area Air District’s 2025 greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory includes direct emissions from homes, commercial businesses, office spaces, places of business, worship, and congregation, entertainment venues, etc., excluding those classified as agricultural and industrial activities.

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Natural and Working Lands

The natural and working lands (NWL) sector includes carbon stocks held in plants and soils in agricultural and forestry lands (working lands) and natural ecosystems like wetlands, forests, and grasslands (natural lands), as well as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from agricultural equipment and livestock. The NWL sector is unique as it is the only sector with the potential to be a carbon sink in addition to a GHG emissions source.

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Power

The Power sector includes generation of electricity in the BARCAP region and its associated greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

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Transportation

The transportation sector includes on-road vehicles (such as light-duty automobiles and heavy-duty trucks) and off-highway mobile sources (such as locomotives, ships, and aircraft). Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from off-road equipment (such as lawn and garden equipment, construction equipment, and agricultural tractors) are included in the inventories for other sectors.

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Waste and Materials

The Waste and Materials sector consists of the food, goods, and building materials consumed and discarded in the BARCAP region.

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Comments

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Commenting is closed for this document.

Kristel Rietesel Jul 30 2025 at 9:57AM on page 3

Suggestion

Please also reach out to families of people with lung and other diseases, as they may be too busy to ask for help. FYI air pollution damages every organ of the body, link

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:31PM on page 42

Suggestion

Adding L2 charging stations will also be helpful. Buying used EVs are a way for lower income folks to adopt EVs, and the earlier EVs and hybrids have lower range. Speaking from my own experience.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:28PM on page 13

Suggestion

This measure from reading the actions seems to lean towards larger contractor businesses/trade unions who leverage programs and/or service multifamily/commercial properties. Feel this should be explicitly added into the language to not give the perception this applies universally to all contractors who work on homes. Referencing my comment earlier in the doc, there are contractors who only have themselves or a few employees that predominantly service single family homes. These "small businesses" could likely be pulled from the Shovels data that they gathered on permitting.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:23PM on page 14

Question

Would this easy-to-access training be at the equipment's installation instructions?

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:20PM on page 13

Question

How much of the housing in the Bay Area is single family compared to multifamily? Asking as this pilot is for multifamily, so it won't be scalable to single family. And single family is a place where renters stay. I know people (friends and co-workers) who rent single family homes. It's also common for college students and recent grads.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:15PM on page 12

Suggestion

Ensuring these program implementers are also trained and knowledgeable on not only the standard "electrified" equivalent equipment to replace a gas one, but know how to avoid unnecessary costs, like panel upsizing/upgrade or triggering the PG&E Green Book considerations.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:13PM on page 12

Question

Are there opportunities for other neighborhood scale improvement projects occurring that would be beneficial to braid together?

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:10PM on page 12

Suggestion

The accessibility should consider not only awareness but time constraints. One needs time to consider applying to all of this, take in the information, make the decisions, and undergo the implementation.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:06PM on page 10

Suggestion

Suggestion on partnering with manufacturers on helping to develop guidance. They will have a vested interest to have good instructions to support correct installations. Something similar happen in the 120V HPWH pilot study implemented in CA a few years bacjk.

in reply to Gail Lee's comment

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 11:00PM on page 9

Suggestion

From discussions in the POWER's multifamily subgroup implementers have shared that there's not a standard solution that's applicable across multifamily buildings as their quite diverse, but the scalability lies in the approach. There will be differences in ownership structure, metering structure, AHJs, transformers, cooperation of tenants, layouts, etc. Having a Technical Assistant to help the owner do audits and find solutions would be the scalable approach.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 10:55PM on page 9

Suggestion

It would be good to leverage the work that will be done in the CEC EPC-24-005 grant project as spreading knowledge and awareness amongst key audiences is one of our activities. More info on the grant project can be found presently here: link

in reply to Yvonne Baginski's comment

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 10:52PM on page 9

Suggestion

There are! I am part of project presently evaluating whether homes that have previously upgraded were necessary or not. If you want to be a part of it, feel free to contact me at the email listed on this page about the POWER group: link

Unsure if it's bad or not to post my email on public comments. Also, not quite sure if Yvonne will see this message or not.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 10:45PM on page 8

Suggestion

These partnerships will likely be more representative of established/large groups (e.g. trade unions, program implementers like TECH), but may not reach the individual contractor servicing single family homes or small properties. Feel there needs to be more engagement with this sector to understand best communication and outreach pathways.

Jenny Low Jul 29 2025 at 10:40PM on page 7

Suggestion

This workforce line is spotlighting the multifamily and commercial sectors, but would not be applicable for how single family workforce operates as it assumes an employer has the capacity to have many employees. Single family contractors operates as a small business and might have as few as 1 employee or none to half a dozen.

in reply to Kristel Rietesel's comment

cherise Jul 29 2025 at 5:27PM on page 3

Suggestion

It is important to see Radius Recycling make the improvements recommended by Alameda County. Now that Radius Recycling is owned by Toyota Tsusho, this is an opportune time to have this location upgrade equipment with advanced Japanese low carbon, net zero, environmental remediation technologies.

I would like to take this opportunity to share the real-life work I have been doing to help solve the pollution problems in the Oakland area and which I hope help to scale globally.

I have had a lot of exposure to the Port of Oakland complex and especially nearby by Schnitzer Steel now Radius Recycling (now Toyota Tsusho). I have had to be on thyroid medication for quite a while now, new breathing problems, lack of energy, feeling "sick" all too often - signs of toxin pollution. When I am outside exposed to the air, especially on hot days, it is the most obvious. I am concerned about cancer and of course all of the above on the community. On the hottest days and more exposure outside or if a window is open, I notice soreness around my next, despite a healthy diet, supplements, zero emissions appliances, the issues prevail.

This is because I am in a hotspot location for this pollution and intentionally I have done this, to both monitor it and perform real-life field testing of the build-up and monitor small test sections of the scalable removal and breakdown of various toxins, pollutants.

Big corporate polluters must be held responsible. In 2002-2004 I called on 3M with a technology to help remediate, or at least add to their PFAS/PFOS packaging products so that when it entered our soil, waterways from litter, landfill pollution, it would be far less toxic. 3M declined, in part saying they wanted more labs done and real-life work; the company I worked for was very cheap (despite being well funded). I never gave up and I tried to make small real-life example work to verify it as a solution to toxins, pollutants, including PFAS. I knew about this, my whole family had some kind of exposure, because eventually we were forced to use the coating on our packaging (boxes) to repel oil, dirt and water to compete with new lower cost plastic packaging coming out of China; which was subsidized. We always questioned it - I promised to find technology to replace or break it down.

There are various low carbon and carbon capture and toxin management technologies which can be added to heavy industrial pollutant facilities such as Radius Recycling, but also industry, the value-chain of PFAS. Additionally, this can support renewable energy and low carbon vehicles from hybrids, EVs to new hydrogen vehicles for the Green Corridor Port Expansion; through hydrogen-fuel and battery-electric trucks and equipment.

Japanese technologies by Mitsubishi, Mitsui and more offer both clean power to clean shipping supporting IMO global carbon framework. This can support EU ETS criteria for US exports of products meeting their clean standards. And Japan falls under the GX ETS. One recent example of renewable energy hydrogen shipping is here: link

Japanese-American company, Mitsubishi Power Americas, offers this very promising suite of technologies:
link

Recently, this major breakthrough was made in Georgia, between Georgia Power and Mitsubishi Power for 50/50 blended hydrogen:
link.

Additionally, regarding electric arc furnaces, Japan's Nippon Steel is producing this equipment: link.

Tim Frank Jul 29 2025 at 5:06PM on page 37

Suggestion

.....Explore the important opportunity presented b y resilient energy resources at schools to educate youth about clean power and high road clean energy jobs.

Tim Frank Jul 29 2025 at 5:01PM on page 28

Suggestion

Urban grey water utilization is an important strategy that should be promoted somewhere within the CAP whether in NWL or elsewhere. The Contra Costa County general plan has suitable model language.

Skylar Sacoolas Jul 29 2025 at 5:01PM on page 1

Question

If this plan can't regulate industrial emissions governed by Cap-and-Trade, who does? And what does public participation look like for that? And what are the regulations currently in place that need improved upon to better protect surrounding communities and environments?

Tim Frank Jul 29 2025 at 4:57PM on page 26

Suggestion

NWL 3.4: Explore establishment of more renewable energy on agricultural lands built and operated with high road labor.

on the list of implementation actions ammend one of the bullets as follows:
mapping suitable sites, establishing criteria for site suitability (e.g. presence of animal agriculture, existence of renewables like wind and commitment of developer to employ high road labor practices.)

to the list of Proposed Supportive Implementors add:
Building Trades Councils.

in reply to Phillip's comment

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 4:54PM on page 42

I think it is still very important to make EV purchases accessible to low-income people now. Many must drive to work--eg: hauling their house-cleaning equipment to more than one worksite per day; driving from more distant, affordable homes in places without public transportation to their jobs...

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 4:49PM on page 41

It seems you are saying that the transition to ZEVs is CARB's, and decreasing VMTs is the MTC's domain, so the BARCAP will focus on the transition to ZEVs.
Even though BARCAP survey results showed strong support for active transportation and much less for transition to ZEVs.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:43PM on page 14

Suggestion

B-3.1: Highlight and promote contractors who hold certifications and credentials (e.g. U.S. DOE Energy Skilled recognition) and provide employees pay, benefits and training associated with high road contracting.

Badging of contractors for quality and equity, much like fair trade designations, appeals to consumer interest in supporting high road practices and helps steer work to contractors who are helping the region meet its decarbonization goals, especially through the competent installation of heat pumps. .....

Proposed Supportive Players: San Jose Clean Energy and other community choice aggregators, other local governments and community organizations.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:34PM on page 14

Suggestion

Potential metrics: # of installations performed by contractors payong a prevailing wage and participating in a state licensed apprenticeship training program.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:33PM on page 13

Suggestion

Replace this paragraph with the following:

While historic rate payer funded programs have lacked both the prevailing wage requirements and the commitments to training that make the public works model effective at building a skilled workforce, new high road programs can elevate the performance of the decarbonization industry and help our region meet its targets, including the competent electrification of space and water heating and cooling systems.

in reply to Anonymous's comment

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 4:31PM on page 40

Agree. For example, CARB gives dairy methane with carbon credits, rewarding and encouraging ever larger, more concentrated--more polluting and more methane-producing per cow-- dairy and beef production enterprises.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:27PM on page 13

Suggestion

Replace the introductory paragraph with the following:
Measure B -3: Support Collaborations and Partnerships that harness the public works model to recruit, train and retain skilled construction workers sufficient to decarbonize our region’s building stock with the speed and quality needed to meet climate goals while deliberately providing family sustaining jobs accessible to women, minorities, residents of low income communities, the justice impacted and veterans.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:23PM on page 12

Suggestion

Pilot a mini-BACHI retrofit program that combines home repair, EE and decarbonization services while using high road labor practices.

Work with Rebuilding Together, Habitat for Humanity and local Building Trades Councils, to leverage programatic resources (funding, technical assistance, outreach) to implement holistic home retrofits for low income and frontline communities within 2-3 counties.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:18PM on page 13

Suggestion

Add to the Proposed Supportive Implementers:

"Local Building Trades Councils"

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:16PM on page 12

Suggestion

To list of Proposed Supportive Implementors add "Building Trades Councils, CTWI, Working Partnerships and other non profit partners of the Building Trades."

Note that Building Trades councils are already working with the City of Richmond in Contra Costa County and with the City of Berkeley in Alameda County around this type of project, and have been in contact with most of the CCAs in the Bay Area regarding potential collaboration.

Martin Reyes Jul 29 2025 at 4:16PM on page 39

Suggestion

Thank you for your efforts to develop the BARCAP. We encourage the Air District to explore how BARCAP can support transportation strategies included in MTC's Plan Bay Area 2050+ through complementary actions, and encourage broadening the focus of the Transportation Sector section to include topics beyond EV adoption/transition such as mode shift and VMT reduction. Please contact Martin Reyes at the San Francisco County Transportation Authority for any questions.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:11PM on page 12

Suggestion

To the list of Proposed Supportive Implementors add
"City of Richmond, ACCE, Contra Costa Building Trades Council"

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:08PM on page 11

Suggestion

add
"Building Trades Councils and Craft Unions" to the list of Proposed Supportive Implementers.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 4:07PM on page 11

Suggestion

....and improved housing and employment conditions for frontline communities.

in reply to Anonymous's comment

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 4:05PM on page 37

It would be good to define this use of tariffs in the document (or by underlining it and linking to the glossary), since most of us haven't heard of this use of the word.

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 4:01PM on page 37

Suggestion

Unfortunately, to enroll in Ava's nascent virtual power plant program means to answer the intrusive questions of the young, venture capital financed tech company Optiwatt. Neither Optiwatt nor PG&E's partner residential energy demand management company OhmConnect, also venture capital backed, inspire enough trust for me to wade in. I have heard from others that they looked into Ava's Optiwatt program but were turned off.
If there is no way around partnering with these for-profit companies, perhaps BARCAP could include best practices, and minimal acceptable practices, for protecting customers' privacy and limiting the amount of profit the companies can extract from the programs.

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 3:23PM on page 10

Suggestion

How about expanding from homeowners to focus also on tools available to renters, whose landlords may not replace their appliances for many years--eg portable "balcony" solar panels and window-mounted heat-pumps, which could potentially work for both single-family and multi-family renters. Can the BARCAP support tenants' rights, knowledge of, and ability to access such tools (access including both availability and affordability)?

Sam Fishman Jul 29 2025 at 3:21PM on page 9

Suggestion

In addition to planning and zoning code changes, a model local ordinance should be developed that direct permit centers to adopt model streamlining processes for permitting, and inspection. This could include requirements to use checklist based permitting without plan checks for same location installations, and virtual inspections.

Sam Fishman Jul 29 2025 at 3:15PM on page 8

Suggestion

In SPUR's Toolbox for Fossil Free Heat, we also suggest "Developing measures to ensure competitive pricing, such as preferred vendor lists, bulk-buy programs, direct install programs (see strategy 2.3), and publication of rebate data."

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 3:12PM on page 36

Question

I think a substantial proportion of the region's population lives in single-family rentals (many owned by large absentee and corporate landlords since 2008). Any reason to restrict mention of renters to those in multi-family buildings?

Sam Fishman Jul 29 2025 at 3:07PM on page 9

Suggestion

Given the six-year BUILDING code freeze, further specifying here that local planning and zoning code updates to enable installation of electric appliances may help clarify what will and wont be available to policymakers in the near future.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 2:56PM on page 10

Suggestion

Add "construction unions" to this list. The workers who electrify buildings are a key stakeholder.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 2:54PM on page 10

Suggestion

add "construction unions" to this list

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 2:42PM on page 6

Suggestion

I would recommend adding a paragraph here as follows:
One confounding challenge to decarbonization is that a diminished share of skilled workers in the construction industry today undermines building performance. The scandalous rate of refrigerant pollution is a result of this. According to the energy consulting firm DNV, 80 percent of the high global warming potential refrigerants sold today end up in the atmosphere due to incompetent installation, maintenance or decommissioning of appliances such as heat pumps. A key response is to align government decarbonization programs in support of rebuilding the share of the construction industry that pays family sustaining wages and utilizes state licensed apprenticeship programs.

Tim Jul 29 2025 at 1:43PM on page 3

Suggestion

A definition of equity that doesn't consider class, gender and other forms of disadvantage is inadequate. I would recommend instead the following: Provide direct, meaningful, desired and assured benefits to frontline communities with a particular focus on providing opportunities for women, minorities, residents of low income communities, the justice impacted and veterans.

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 1:42PM on page 29

Suggestion

Right tree right place is so important, and I hope rapid and widespread dissemination of this information is given priority.
Urban greening, especially in frontline communities/heat islands, has many local benefits as well as GHG benefits.
However, the street trees that attracted us to our North Oakland neighborhood were inappropriate choices, and I would hate to see similar mistakes be made as frontline communities get the trees they deserve.
Our aged street trees are too big: they shade solar panels (and roofs that could otherwise host panels); they drop limbs on homes and cars; they deposit leaves on roofs including those too high to get to for gutter cleaning.
Their roots lift and break sidewalks, creating hazards and ADA inaccessibility, as well as major repair and replacement expenses.
They require regular trimming, which is very expensive--the City used to do this every two years (a unfair service to wealthier neighborhoods paid for by all neighborhoods) but can't afford to now--it cost us over $1000 to get the one street tree in front of our house trimmed.
To reduce electric line hazards, PG&E sometimes hacks out portions.

Long range planning with expert arborist "right tree right place" advice before planting is essential.

Ann Harvey Jul 29 2025 at 1:24PM on page 33

Suggestion

I like all the listed metrics, but amounts of storage added seem to be missing and are also important.

Sarah Church Jul 29 2025 at 11:45AM on page 43

Suggestion

Whether front-of-mind or not, the carbon footprints of any local businesses or nonprofits that contract with local governments appear in the Scope 3 supply chain emissions of those governments, and transportation is of course a major source. Consider local governments as partners to reach supply chain.

Sarah Church Jul 29 2025 at 11:43AM on page 43

Suggestion

Consider businesses / nonprofits not only as consumers but also as employers who may be able to partner to support uptake among their staff, for example by hosting chargers.

Sarah Church Jul 29 2025 at 11:40AM on page 37

Suggestion

Would recommend alignment not only with emergency response plans but with local Emergency Managers Associations and local jurisdictions engaged in EM. EM staff can inform efforts beyond what is codified in plans.

Sarah Church Jul 29 2025 at 11:37AM on page 30

Suggestion

"...encouraging new urban greening *efforts* to include..." - because once goals have been solidified into projects, many decisions are already made.

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