Model metropolis

How one university’s environmental initiative is transforming Los Angeles—and setting the standard for sustainability efforts around the world

By WP BrandStudio

A few years ago, a climate modeler named Alex Hall working in the Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences department of UCLA created a map of the future. Synthesizing multiple global weather models, Hall constructed a high-resolution climate map of California’s greater Los Angeles region as it might appear in the years 2050 and 2100. His projections confirmed environmentalists’ worst fears of the failure to take serious action to combat climate change.

The climate map showed an increase in average temperature of four to five degrees and, in some areas, extreme heat spells of more than 95 degrees for at least 100 days of the year. These same factors would also lead to a decrease in mountain snowpack in northern California—essential to LA’s water supply—and a dangerous increase in wildfires.

For Hall and other researchers, this projection was more than a nightmare scenario. It was a call to action for groundbreaking intervention. Looking at the environmental challenges the city faces now and into the future, UCLA scholars across a range of disciplines have come together in an ambitious, multipronged and deeply optimistic effort to forge a more sustainable path forward for Los Angeles.

Known as the Sustainable LA Grand Challenge, the campus-wide initiative and research effort aims to improve LA’s ecosystems and enable the region to be 100 percent reliant on renewable energy and local water by the year 2050. Leveraging the university’s latest research and technological innovations, the Grand Challenge is creating new sustainability solutions that local utilities, businesses and government are putting into practice.

UCLA’s ambitious plan will not only help the city thrive and shield the population from the most dire implications of Hall’s forecasts; but it will also serve as a model for tackling complex urban climate adaptation issues throughout the rest of the state, nation and other cities around the world.

The future will be renewable

“We first started talking about this in 2012, and now it might not sound as audacious as it did then,” said Mark Gold, associate vice chancellor for environment and sustainability at UCLA and lead for the Grand Challenge, which envisions transitioning the electric grid to rely solely on renewable power, such as wind and solar. At the time, LA counted on fossil fuels, including coal and natural gas, for around 60 percent of its energy, with renewable sources supplying only 20 percent.

In the years since, much has changed. The Grand Challenge is part of a broader clean energy movement across the state “In California, the legislature recently passed Senate Bill 100, which was signed into law by former Governor [Jerry] Brown last year, and has the goal of 100 percent carbon-free energy by 2045,” Gold said. His team’s strategy undergirds the new statewide commitment with practical solutions.

In one project, for example, UCLA scientists are using nanoengineering to develop new solar-panel arrays that more efficiently collect solar heat and visible light. Another project focuses on how boosting renewables use will both mitigate climate change and lower pollution. Driven by her own experience growing up with poor air quality in China, Yifang Zhu, professor of environmental health sciences and associate dean for academic programs in the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, pursues research dedicated to looking at the health impact of a cleaner power supply.

These efforts are working: Los Angeles is on track to hit California’s mandated 33 percent renewable energy target next year, and the City has committed to ending its reliance on coal-fired power by 2025.

The water quandary

One doesn’t have to be a close observer of Los Angeles’ ecosystems to know the city has water troubles. But it’s not just prolonged droughts and raging wildfires. LA is handicapped by its reliance on external water supplies. “The city of Los Angeles is notorious as a water importer—on average importing roughly 90 percent of their water from more than 200 miles away,” Gold said. As a result, the Grand Challenge’s other key focus is shifting an arid city to 100 percent local water.

Today, much of the city’s water comes from the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Yet rising average temperatures are threatening that supply, increasing drought frequency and lowering snowfall and snowpack accumulation in the range. Without dramatic shifts, water reserves will diminish, making management more difficult and sharply raising the cost of a vital resource. UCLA’s extensive water science, policy and engineering faculty believe the right combination of strategy and technology can jumpstart the transition to local sources.

A key intervention is being pioneered by Yoram Cohen, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering. One of LA’s primary challenges is that potential local water sources tend to be brackish or contaminated. Cohen has been developing an innovation to make them viable. He and his colleagues at UCLA’s Water Technology Research Center are creating specialized molecular membrane filters to treat undrinkable water.

“There are many different types of membranes for different applications,” he said. “At UCLA we’ve developed various ones, including membranes that are currently being tested for treating sewage to drinking water quality standards and cleaning up oil and gas process water for water supply,” all of which can benefit local communities elsewhere.

Cohen’s work is just one of the many avenues UCLA faculty are taking to pioneer wastewater solutions. In another project, the research team of Richard Kaner, Eric Hoek and Shaily Mahendra is creating futuristic membranes that can resist being clogged and corroded over time.

Innovate locally, improve climate globally

For JR DeShazo, director of UCLA’s Luskin Center for Innovation, research and technology are essential components of environmental progress, but not sufficient on their own. To meet its goals, the Grand Challenge needs local governments—and communities and corporations—to support systemic change. “The innovation that we see happening in climate change, in water, renewable energy, electric vehicles and the adoption of those technologies is always accompanied by, and spurred by, a set of public policies,” DeShazo said.

UCLA has long been a partner for LA government, at both the city and county level, in developing sustainability strategies. Since the Grand Challenge began, that role has only increased. Such policies include efforts to expand the number of electric vehicle charging stations in Los Angeles County. Another policy developed by DeShazo’s team encourages businesses to install solar panels, and sell excess power to Los Angeles Water and Power.

These efforts extend beyond LA city government. DeShazo cites many forward-thinking California-wide policies that UCLA has helped shape and implement over the last decade or so, including rebates that incentivize Californians of all income levels to adopt electric vehicles. Examples like these, he said, demonstrate how local initiatives can catalyze novel solutions and policy change at the state, national and international levels. Urban centers—which face the gravest environmental challenges but also nurture the resources for groundbreaking innovation—are laboratories for tackling these issues. “Cities are on the front lines,” DeShazo said.

Gold fully endorses that view. “Much of what has occurred in a positive way in the environment has really started from the local level,” he said. “And what we’re seeing—even, I think, far before the Paris Accords [on climate change] were signed—is that cities and regional governments have been more progressive than nations already.” UCLA’s impact on sustainability outcomes for Los Angeles and the wider region illustrates the vital role that committed urban institutions can have in helping win the race to safeguard the planet.

This content is paid for by an advertiser and published by WP BrandStudio. The Washington Post newsroom was not involved in the creation of this content. Learn more about WP BrandStudio.