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How We Rated Cities

As part of this category, we analyzed four areas:

  • Whether the city has an overall plan for sustainability
  • Whether it has a sustainability or environmental department that manages and tracks sustainability efforts across the city
  • Whether the city is working in collaboration with a major federal research laboratory or research university
  • Whether the city is working with a non-governmental organization across the city, rather than in only a single neighborhood

2008 Rankings

2008 Rankings

Many cities tied for number one (!), with a perfect 4/4 across the above subcategories. This year, in addition to the above key areas, we also analyzed public outreach campaigns (media, workshops, awards) and availability of green community grants to fund further outreach and awareness efforts. Cities were credited according to effectiveness of education and outreach activities.

Cities scoring a perfect 5/5 included: New York, Portland, Seattle. Following in fourth place closely behind were: Columbus, Denver, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and San Francisco.

The 43 cities that responded to the survey are included in this list. SustainLane was not able to rate cities listed as N/A as data was unavailable.

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If you think mitigated climate change is expensive, try unmitigated climate change. —Dr. Richard Gammon, University of Washington

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