Carbon Neutral Households: Making the transition through learning from experiences in community health

The challenge to address climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions has reached a new urgency with recent evidence from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The main issue currently identified is fossil fuel combustion for heating and cooling, transport and other electricity and energy services. Various technical interventions are available to reduce, substitute or otherwise avoid greenhouse gas emissions associated with fossil fuels, however, their rate of uptake remains relatively low. There are a range of nontechnical barriers which can be identified to explain why household greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise in the face of technical means to reduce them. These are well-documented over a period of decades and include the so-called ‘energy efficiency gap’. Put simply, a range of economic, social, cultural and human capacity factors prevent the rapid transition towards carbon neutral households that is needed. The paper presents a definition of ‘carbon neutral communities’, and the case for the vast majority of householders moving rapidly towards a carbon neutral lifestyle at home. Then, starting with the thesis that nontechnical social capacity barriers have faced major public health issues in the past (e.g. seat belts, drinkdriving, smoking), the authors consider the prospects for translating leanings from these experiences and applying them in achieving carbon neutral households. Discussion specifically includes the relationship between individual and collective behavior changes. Conclusions are drawn which provide clear directions for future policy and project-oriented approaches addressing the role of behavior and capacity in the drive towards carbon neutral households.