OSCAR Builds Sustainable Resilience In The Wake Of Marshall Fire

BOULDER, CO — The second half of 2021 — the months leading up to the devastating Marshall Fire — were some of the hottest and driest six months Colorado has ever experienced, said Zac Swank, built environment coordinator for Boulder County's Office of Sustainability, Climate Action & Resilience.

The western part of the country is also in the middle of a 22-year-long drought, something, Swank said, that hasn't happened since the 1500s. And Boulder County has been in a state of "continuous recovery from a fire or a flood since 2010."

"We’re living with climate change now," Swank said. "It’s clear that climate change is fueling disasters like these. What we’re trying to do now is to reduce continued contributions to climate change, which will exacerbate disasters like [the Marshall Fire] and cause them to be more frequent."

Swank is a part of a collaboration between Boulder County, the City of Louisville, the Town of Superior, the State of Colorado, Xcel Energy and others from various non-profits, cities and towns who are working together to rebuild the homes that razed by the Marshall Fire in a way that will have the least impact on the environment.

"Step one is to build those homes in such a way that they don’t consume as much energy," Swank said. "They’re more comfortable, they have better air quality, they cost less money to operate and other than that, they look like any other house. They’re just built differently, and not necessarily more expensive to build, it’s just different design choices along the way."

"The principles that we’re talking about are familiar and longstanding," he added, saying that the goal is to "effectively have a net-zero energy home, where they’re producing as much energy as they consume. "

Some ways these new homes will get to that net-zero goal are through solar power where possible, electrifying homes to reduce the use of fossil fuels and increasing insulation values, Swank said.

But this more environmentally conscious community that is in the works is only one component of the fight against climate change, Swank said.

"We’re past the point where individual action alone is enough. We absolutely need individual action. We need neighborhood-level action; action by businesses; state, local, federally, it’s going to take all of it," Swank said. "There are no silver bullets to changing course on climate change. The closest thing we have to one is federal legislation: putting a price on carbon. That is the single biggest lever we could pull to effect change."

And though individual action on its own is no longer enough, there are things that individuals can do that can have an impact.

"There’s a million things that need to be done: we need to, in our own homes, increase our insulation, we need to electrify our heating and hot water and cooking fuels," Swank said, adding that it is also important to be "electrifying our transportation, choosing electric vehicles, putting pressure on our local governments, our state governments, our federal government."

But in terms of finding a long-term way for people to positively engage with this crisis, Swank suggested the value of climate scientist Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson's Venn Diagram of effective action.

"It’s a combination of what needs doing, what are you good at and what brings you joy," Swank said. "Where you have overlap of those three things, I believe, that’s where you’ll have the most sustainable effort. The effort that folks will stick with the longest. There’s no one thing. I say for everyone, find what is something that they are passionate about and is something that they would enjoy working on over time."

"We have been working on this for decades and we will continue to be working on this for decades," he added. "The current trajectory that we’re on is it’s going to get more dire and more stressful. Finding a way to positively engage is a really important thing."

But despite the darkness of the climate disaster, Swank still has hope for the future, "in the way that folks have come together, not only the folks that are working on this effort to help residents rebuild with homes that are better than the homes that they lost, but just the amount of outpouring and support."

"I think also, unfortunately, these events garner attention for climate change, which is invisible and hard to understand and see, and [is] somewhat slow in this massive global problem that is very tangible," Swank added. "The focus on how do we make changes in our society so that this doesn’t happen again that I’ve been seeing as a result of this disaster, that gives me hope. "

And despite all the strides that Boulder has made in working to combat climate change, Swank emphasized that this is a battle that must be undertaken by everyone, at all status and government levels and across the world.

"Boulder County can’t do it alone. We need to be doing more," Swank said. "No one anywhere is doing enough on Climate Change. We’re all in this together, and we need that action at the individual level, at the corporate level, at the state level, at the federal level. Everyone needs to be working on this together."