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The cost to the environment in terms of climate change looms even larger.
Flooding, shoreline erosion, 100-year storms that reoccur in just a few years and other severe weather events are all related to growing global emissions and their adverse affects on climate change.
“There’s an urgent need to reduce our emissions in order to avoid the worst possible impacts of climate change,” said Claire Sanders, a climate change specialist with the Essex Region Conservation Authority.
Sanders was brought on board two years ago after the region experienced devastating flooding in 2016 and 2017, resulting in more than $230 million in damages.
“Climate change is a reality,” said Gary McNamara, Mayor of Tecumseh and, as county warden, co-chair of a new community task force assigned to develop a regional energy plan.
The task force is co-chaired by Dan Hanson, an electrician by trade and a past president of the Windsor Construction Association.
The task force includes a diverse range of stakeholders from transportation, housing authorities, school boards, business, youth, public and private sectors, commerce and utilities.
“We need the whole community to move this forward,” McNamara said. “We’ve been talking about climate change for 20 years but now we’re seeing it. What they told us 20 years ago is happening today. We need to start paying attention.”
McNamara said the county has 90,000 homes built 25-plus years ago which leaves them sorely lacking in energy efficiency.
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