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Climate Smart San Jose

San José Community Leads on Climate Change

Climate Smart San José (Climate Smart), adopted by the City Council in 2018 and updated in 2025, lays out how we are doing our part to address climate change. It’s a community wide initiative to reduce air pollution, save water and improve quality of life.

Climate Smart is one of the first detailed city plans for reaching the targets of the international Paris Agreement. To get there, Climate Smart set ambitious goals for energy, water, transportation and local jobs. In November 2021, City Council set a goal of communitywide carbon neutrality by 2030, thereby accelerating Climate Smart, and approved the City's Pathway to Carbon Neutrality by 2030 in June 2022. This Carbon Neutrality one-page flyer provides a summary of the Pathway.

Since the Climate Smart plan was adopted in 2018, significant changes have occurred. To stay aligned with the latest climate science, updated data, and adopted City policies, the City has updated Climate Smart to better reflect its climate goals. This update ensures the plan remains effective, forward-looking, and impactful, guiding the City’s continued efforts to reduce emissions and support climate action.

We’re grateful to our stakeholders and community partners who have supported Climate Smart San José and participated in its creation.

Stay Up-to-date

Do you want to stay up to date with Climate Smart programs and initiatives? Browse previous issues of our quarterly newsletter, San José Climate Chronicles, and complete the Climate Smart San José newsletter and email form to be added to our email notification list.

Climate Smart Semi-Annual Update

You can also view the most recent Climate Smart Semi-Annual Update:

Rebates and Incentives

Find out about local, regional, statewide, and federal incentives to help you electrify your home on the San José Clean Energy Electric Homes webpage and electrify your ride through the San José Clean Energy Electric Vehicles program.

How can you help?

Sign up for the Climate Smart Challenge! It’s a fun and easy way to track your carbon footprint, lower your bills and make a difference in your community.

Our Climate Smart community playbooks also offer useful tips and resources for being Climate Smart.

Join the Climate Smart Stakeholders monthly meeting (virtual) to hear about the latest climate initiatives, share your insights, and ask questions. Email ClimateSmart@sanjoseca.gov to be added to the meeting invitation and receive meeting agendas and notes.

Request a presentation to learn more about Climate Smart. Please complete the Climate Smart Presentation Request Form to request a Climate Smart presentation for your community group, school, neighborhood association, or business.

Check out additional What You Can Do resources to help reduce your carbon footprint, whether you are a resident, business or civic agency.

Notable Achievements

  • 2022: Largest U.S. city to remove minimum parking requirements for new developments
  • 2022: One of the largest U.S. cities to adopt a carbon neutrality by 2030 goal
  • 2019: Largest city to adopt a building reach code incentivizing all-electric new construction and then (2020) prohibiting natural gas infrastructure in all new construction with minimal exceptions
  • 2018: Approved largest single jurisdiction community choice aggregation program (purchasing cleaner power for our community in the state 

Recognition

For our climate work, San José is proud to have received recognition from various organizations: 

Greenest-Cities-in-America

Resources

contact us

If you have any questions or suggestions, please email ClimateSmart@sanjoseca.gov.