HONOREE INDUSTRY: Municipal Services 

Texan by Nature is excited to recognize the municipal services industry for the first time in the TxN 20 this year.

COMPANY OVERVIEW:

As the most visited city in Texas, San Antonio welcomes 31 million visitors each year. The city boasts a population of 1.5 million with a diverse culture and world-renowned historical sites, such as the Alamo and San Antonio Missions. Annually, San Antonio’s gross metro product is $134 billion, coming from many of the city’s important industry sectors, such as tourism, which alone brings in approximately $13.4 billion per year. Making San Antonio a great place to live, work, and play is an important job the City of San Antonio’s Office of Sustainability (CoSA OS) achieves while enhancing the environment, quality-of-life, and economic vitality of the city. As the population of San Antonio grows, rising energy costs and the implications of the long-term impact of current levels of energy consumption are important issues for the City of San Antonio to address. 

Efforts to improve environmental quality and reduce consumption make sense both socially and economically for the City of San Antonio. In passing San Antonio’s first Climate Action & Adaptation Plan, CoSA committed to reach carbon neutrality by 2050 and is working to achieve Zero Net Energy for all municipal buildings by 2040 through both conservation and procurement of renewable energy for municipal operations. In leading by example, the municipal government has completed 414 energy projects within 190 municipal facilities from Fiscal Year 2011 through Fiscal Year 2019, resulting in a total annual of $1.6 million in cost savings. In addition, CoSA is currently reducing energy use in its fleet through electrification and other efficiency measures. The City’s Solid Waste Management Department created a Recycling & Resource Recovery Plan in 2013 with the goal of a 60% recycling rate by 2025. CoSA has expanded its curbside organics service and increased its marketing efforts to increase participation in recycling.

SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS STRATEGY: 

The mission of the City of San Antonio Office of Sustainability (CoSA OS) is to enhance the environment, quality of life, and economic vitality for all residents and future generations through innovative plans, programs, and policies. Conservation is a key tool for ensuring that the natural resources the city depends on are healthy and resilient. Through the city’s Climate Action & Adaptation Plan and various other programs, biodiversity, green infrastructure, and healthy ecosystems are prioritized. In addition, this plan ensures a resilient city through advancing energy conservation, green and efficient transportation options, advancing the circular economy, and educating and empowering San Antonio residents with a goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. For the CoSA OS, taking care of nature helps them take care of the people that visit the city and call it home.

EMPLOYEE LEADERSHIP

The Office of Sustainability is fortunate to partner with a diverse network of City departments, agencies, and non-profit organizations working to enhance environmental and energy conservation, economic development, and equity together. The city’s elected leadership understands the importance of this agenda and endorsed it through the passage of the SA Climate Ready, Climate Action & Adaptation Plan in 2019. Key external partners include the San Antonio River Authority, the San Antonio Water System, CPS Energy, the Edwards Aquifer Authority and Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance, the Alamo Area Monarch Collaborative, the Sierra Club, the Mitchell Lake Audubon Center, and many other community, non-profit and business-sector stakeholders.  

CONSERVATION PROGRAMS

Biological Diversity

In May of 2020, on International Day for Biological Diversity, San Antonio was chosen to join 9 other U.S. cities and counties as Pioneers to the international ‘CitiesWithNature’ Platform, endorsed by the UN Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity as the official mechanism for local governments to share policies and committed actions to protect nature, prioritize nature-based solutions to climate change, account for ecosystem services and make sure residents have easy access to nature and the outdoors. The designation highlights San Antonio’s record of prioritizing investments that elevate and regenerate the beauty and livability of the community as well as protecting their natural assets. 

Examples include:

• Collaboration in establishing the Bracken Cave Preserve, home to the largest bat colony in the world – 20 million Mexican free-tailed bats!
• Committing to the National Wildlife Federation’s Mayors’ Monarch Pledge and establishing pollinator gardens throughout the city that support millions of pollinators, like monarch butterflies that migrate through the San Antonio area twice each year. 
• In October 2020, San Antonio announced the establishment of a Tri-National Friendship Pollinator Garden to highlight cooperation for pollinator support between the United States, Mexico, and Canada.  
• Investing in miles of hike and bike trails along the San Antonio River and creekways, like the approximately 80 miles and 1500 acres of the Greenway Trails System.
• Conserving land over the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone, our primary source of drinking water. Since 2000, the City of San Antonio has committed $280 million to the protection of over 160,000 acres of land through the Edwards Aquifer Protection Program. Learn more in this article from KSAT.
• Formerly a wastewater disposal site, the 1,200-acre Mitchell Lake Audubon Center provides a place to rest and refuel for hundreds of species that travel through the Central Flyway bird migration route.
• The San Antonio Missions National Historical Park is a UNESCO World Heritage Site – the first in Texas. 

The City of San Antonio is committed to caring for nature and celebrating these initiatives as they work together to sustainably steward the planet.

Investment in Energy & Water Conservation 

San Antonio’s municipally-owned utility, CPS Energy, is evaluating proposals to procure 900 megawatts of new solar generating capacity, 50 megawatts of battery storage, and 500 megawatts of reliable capacity from new technology solutions. Between 2010 and 2020, CPS Energy’s Save for Tomorrow Energy Plan (STEP) saved over 800 megawatts at an estimated cost of $719 million, 15% less than originally forecasted. 

Building on a legacy of conservation and innovative energy efficiency investments, the City is working with CPS Energy to develop a pathway to 100% renewable energy for municipal operations and is currently developing a request for proposals for renewable options to be released before the end of 2020. 

On August 8, 2011, the City Council passed Ordinance 2011-08-18-0657, which established the Energy Efficiency Fund (EEF) to fund energy conservation projects in its facilities that reduce utility expenditures. The fund was designed to receive utility saving dollars from completed utility conservation projects as well as project incentives or rebates received from CPS Energy and San Antonio Water System (SAWS). During the 2013 annual budget and in order to expand the funding available for additional utility conservation projects, City Council adopted a mechanism to return utility savings and incentive or rebate dollars from utility conservation projects funded by the EEF back to the EEF. This action represents a long-term commitment by the City to pursue energy conservation. San Antonio is the only city in the State of Texas with such a fund in place and is one of only a handful in the country to utilize this model.

• The EEF has completed 414 energy projects within 190 municipal facilities from Fiscal Year 2011 through Fiscal Year 2019, which has resulted in total annual avoided cost savings of $1.6 million. 

Between 1992 and 2018 SAWS invested $162 million in residential & commercial programs, leading to $762 million in avoided costs. Their water-wise programs and rebates help residents save water, thereby reducing water bills. To date, the City of San Antonio and San Antonio Water System have saved their residential and commercial customers more than 1 trillion gallons of water through cost-saving conservation programs! SAWS serves about 460,000 water and 411,000 wastewater customers, or about 1.6 million people, in the San Antonio metropolitan area (including most of the city of San Antonio, several suburban municipalities, and adjacent parts of Bexar County).

On March 5, 2020, San Antonio joined other communities in Texas by adopting a Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) program within the city limits. PACE is an innovative financing tool that allows owners of commercial, industrial, nonprofit, and large multi-family residential properties access to low-cost, long-term loans to conduct energy efficiency and water conservation improvements to real property.

BUILDING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE

As an extension of the local government, the Office of Sustainability will continue to play a leadership role in researching best practices and introducing policies that advance the conservation of San Antonio’s unique natural resources. As the city moves into the future, they will continue to advance policies that mitigate and respond to the inter-related issues of climate change, emergency preparedness, pandemic recovery, racial injustice, nature conservation, and access to resources simultaneously. To ensure equitable implementation of its policies, programs, and projects,  the City will convene diverse voices from throughout the community and continue to educate and empower residents to help shape their vision of the community. Important initiatives like reducing the urban heat island, restoring native habitat and protecting the tree canopy, regenerating urban natural ecosystems, ensuring aquifer recharge and responsible land stewardship, and increasing residents’ access to and enjoyment of nature will continue.   

TEXAN-LED CONSERVATION:

The Office of Sustainability is embedded in the local community of San Antonio, the 7th largest city in the nation and 3rd largest in Texas. As the population throughout Texas continues to expand, municipalities will grapple with how best to manage the positive and not-so-positive impacts of growth. To stay competitive and livable, the Office of Sustainability supports San Antonio policymakers in exploring and embracing innovative policies, programs and projects to conserve water, save energy, improve air quality, lower the urban heat island, and ensure local food security. As a major population hub in Texas, San Antonio is committed to working with public and private stakeholders in the city and across the state to take decisive and urgent measures to protect the very things that humans need to survive:  clean air, clean water and green space to recreate, rejuvenate and reflect. Perhaps less apparent, but equally valuable are the joy and wonder communities experience when birds migrate through the Central Flyway, when butterflies rest and feed in fields, when cold, clear water bubbles up from the rock-bottom creek beds, and when the big Texas sunset illuminates a pink and orange sky. These things and many more are why conservation is vital to the City of San Antonio, to Texas, and throughout the world.  

Learn more about the City of San Antonio’s sustainability efforts.