Council looks at reducing energy

CASEY Council is considering becoming carbon neutral to help slow the impact of climate change.
Following the lead of other Victorian councils, the council will look into reducing its energy consumption and offsetting its carbon emissions within the next 10 years.
At Tuesday night’s council meeting, councillor Michael Farley said council should consider setting the target of being carbon neutral and include this in the development of its sustainability plan.
“What we are asking council to do is report back on this important issue, weigh up the cost, both the social cost and the dollar cost, to see if it is a viable thing,” Cr Farley said. “I think it will be.”
City of Casey engineering and environmental services manager David Richardson said the council would need to look at reducing energy consumption and reducing the energy used in council’s fleet of cars, and is already looking at hybrid cars and changing cars over to gas.
He said council must also then consider the cost of other offsetting initiatives such as purchasing carbon credits and planting trees to meet the target.
Mr Richardson said two metropolitan councils estimated costs of between $1.3 to $1.6 million initially to achieve the target and a further $200,000 to $300,000 each year to make their councils carbon neutral.