As world leaders convened at the annual U.N. climate conference in November, scientists reported that carbon dioxide levels in the earth’s atmosphere had reached another record — 423 parts per million, more than 50% higher than preindustrial levels.

As a result, 2023 was the hottest year ever recorded and 2024 in on track to be even hotter. The cause: Humanity’s unabated burning of coal, oil and natural gas has unleashed massive amounts of CO2.

The result is more frequent and intense wildfires, prolonged droughts, hotter heat waves, increasingly destructive hurricanes, deadlier floods, ocean acidification, sea level rise, species extinctions and collapsing fisheries.

According to climate scientists, unless immediate action is taken to rapidly phase out fossil fuels in favor of clean, renewable energy, our worsening climate poses grave threats to human civilization in the decades ahead.

But such critical action is not happening fast enough. Despite Congress having adopted historic climate legislation two years ago, global energy demand is growing faster than clean energy is expanding.

If only the world was following Sonoma County’s lead.

Even before the 2017 wildfires, most residents here were well informed about the existential threat of climate change and taking action.

In 2009, Sonoma County formed one of the nation’s first climate protection agencies. The Regional Climate Protection Authority, governed by a 12-member board comprised of county supervisors and city council members, set an ambitious goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2030, an 80% reduction from 1990 levels.

Earlier this year, the agency debuted an online greenhouse gas inventory dashboard showing how much each city and the county has lowered its emissions over the past three decades.

In 2014, county supervisors launched Sonoma Clean Power, which has helped homeowners and businesses reduce their collective carbon footprint by offering cleaner electricity options from sources such as geothermal, wind and solar. Sonoma Clean Power is currently leading an effort to build 600 megawatts of next generation geothermal energy at The Geysers, with the potential to provide 24/7 renewable power to California’s electric grid.

Sonoma County residents were among the nation’s first adopters of hybrid cars and fully electric vehicles. Remarkably, 1 of 4 cars sold in Sonoma County in the last two years was a zero-emission vehicle.

As part of its recently adopted Blueprint for Climate Action, Petaluma has begun converting most of its 250-vehicle fleet to electric, and additional climate initiatives have been completed or are underway, including a 17-acre floating solar project at the municipal wastewater plant. The photovoltaic project, expected to be operational by fall 2025, will slash carbon emissions while saving an estimated $13 million in electrical costs over the next 20 years.

Such ambitious policies have established Petaluma as a regional and national climate leader.

But the city of Petaluma and Sonoma County each rely, to varying degrees, on federal grants to achieve their climate goals. W hat will happen when Donald Trump, who has pledged to abolish the country’s clean energy laws, becomes president in January?

Trump promised to repeal the 2022 climate legislation funding renewable energy projects and cancel regulations that encourage the manufacturing of electric vehicles. Could Trump really turn back the clock on the nation’s historic climate legislation? He will have a hard time doing so, according to Ellie Cohen, CEO of the Climate Center, a Sonoma County-based nonprofit organization that works to reduce climate pollution in California.

Because 80% of the federal climate law’s money spent in the first two years has flowed to states with mostly Republican-led congressional districts, repealing the law will be a challenge, Cohen said.

“It will be very hard to stop clean energy projects already in the works that are embedded in the economy” she said, citing an enormous car battery manufacturing plant in North Carolina that spurred the creation of 5,000 new jobs.

As for abolishing tailpipe emission rules designed to encourage carmakers to produce more electric vehicles, Cohen pointed to a recent article in the New York Times reporting that major U.S. car manufacturers don’t want the rules changed.

Automakers, the story noted, “have already invested billions in a transition to electric vehicles” and to remain “successful and competitive,” it needed “stability and predictability in auto-related emissions standards.”

California’s ambitious climate goals, which include a ban on sales of gasoline-powered new cars after 2035, may take a hit in the short run, says Cohen, in part due to state budget shortfalls.

But California is still the world’s fifth-largest economy and residents here share an enduring commitment to a climate-safe future for our children and grandchildren.

Says Cohen, “As goes California, so goes the world!”

John Burns is a former publisher of the Petaluma Argus-Courier. He can be reached at john.burns@arguscourier.com.

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