What businesses can do

Key climate response steps include reducing and planning for climate change impacts.

1. Reducing your climate pollution:
   1. Inventory your operational greenhouse gas emissions
   2. Establish emissions reduction targets
   3. Identify projects and actions to reduce emissions
   4. Begin emission reduction actions
   5. Assess progress and next steps
   Additional resources:
   Seattle Climate Partnership: One of the Green Ribbon Commission’s key recommendations was the formation of the Seattle Climate Partnership—a voluntary pact among Seattle-area employers to take action to reduce their own emissions, and to work together to help meet the community-wide goal.
   U.S. EPA Climate Leaders Program: Climate Leaders is an EPA industry-government partnership that works with companies to develop comprehensive climate change strategies. Participating companies commit to reduce their impact on the global environment by completing a corporate-wide inventory of their greenhouse gas emissions based on a quality management system, setting aggressive reduction goals, and annually reporting their progress to EPA. Through program participation, companies create a credible record of their accomplishments and receive EPA recognition as corporate environmental leaders.
   Bay Area Business Council Resources on Climate Change: The Business Council on Climate Change (BC3) is a partnership of San Francisco Bay Area businesses committed to reducing their green house gas emissions. BC3 members collaborate to share ideas and real-world case studies, identify valuable tools, participate in educational forums, and establish best practices.
   Climate Biz: Climate Biz provides green business news and tools for aligning sustainability with business success. It has resources for successful green strategies, covering operations, marketing, energy, product design and more.
   The EnviroStars program was created in King County, Washington as a service of the Local Hazardous Waste Management Program in 1995, and has since been adopted across the Puget Sound region, with programs now offered in Jefferson, King, Kitsap, Pierce and Whatcom counties. EnviroStars was designed to give small businesses incentives and recognition for reducing hazardous materials and waste, in order to protect public health, municipal systems, and the environment.
   King County Sustainable Building Tools: Comprehensive resources to help professional builders and individuals recycle, reduce waste, save money, and get recognition for embracing sustainable building practices.
2. Plan and prepare for climate change impacts:
   Conduct a climate change vulnerability assessment
   Develop and implement an adaptation plan to enhance human health and natural and built environment resilience
   Additional resources:
   King County Adaptation Guidebook: Preparing for Climate Change A Guidebook for Local, Regional, and State Governments in PDF format.
   University of Washington Climate Impacts Group The Climate Impacts Group (CIG) is an interdisciplinary research group studying the impacts of natural climate variability and global climate change ("global warming") on the U.S. Pacific Northwest (PNW). Through research and interaction with regional stakeholders, the CIG works to increase the resilience of the Pacific Northwest to fluctuations in climate.
   Washington State Department of Ecology Climate Change Impacts Due to increased concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) already accumulated in the atmosphere, Washington will face certain impacts to our forests, agriculture, snowpack, rivers, coastal waters and other natural resources that we so value. The extent and duration of these impacts will largely be determined by our collective success in reducing future emissions of GHGs.
   City of Chicago’s Quick guide to Climate Change Preparation: - 560 KB PDF