Amid more extreme weather Pierce County lags in its climate change goals
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Pierce County falls behind in goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45%.
- Building heating, gas-powered vehicles and tree canopy loss drive county emissions.
- Extreme heat, drought, wildfires and floods strain infrastructure and raise costs.
Amid more severe weather, including flooding and extreme heat, Pierce County is falling behind its goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45% in five years.
On Dec. 16 the Pierce County Council adopted new action items for its “Sustainability 2030: Pierce County’s Resilience and Climate Action Plan,” but preliminary figures show the county is lagging behind its 2030 goals. The ordinance passed along party lines, with Democrats Rosie Ayala, Bryan Yambe, Jani Hitchen and Robyn Denson voting in favor and Republicans Dave Morell, Paul Herrera and Amy Cruver voting against.
According to Pierce County, most of the countywide greenhouse gas emissions come from “heating residential and commercial buildings, driving gas-powered vehicles and removing trees to develop land.”
From 2015 to 2019, Pierce County’s overall emissions increased by 16% (amid a 7% population increase), according to the latest analysis of Pierce County’s greenhouse gas emissions. Preliminary findings suggest emissions in 2022 were slightly lower than in 2019 but are still off track for meeting the 2030 goal.
“Emissions increases are primarily driven by tree canopy loss, changes in the electricity fuel mix and population growth,” per the 2022 report. “Increased efficiency of passenger vehicles (decreased emissions per mile) was the largest contributor to decreasing emissions. More efficient electricity use by households and commercial entities and reduced per-capita waste generation also contributed considerably to decreasing emissions.”
What does climate change look like in Pierce County?
In Pierce County, global warming has resulted in extreme weather changes (like heavy precipitation or drought), extreme heat (which leads to more frequent and severe wildfires), glacial and snowpack melt (which contributes to flooding and decreased water supply), landslides, sea level rise, increased ocean acidity and water temperature increases (which harms animals like salmon and contributes to toxic algae blooms), according to the county.
Damage to roads, bridges, power lines and water systems as a result of climate-related disasters is also becoming more costly and disruptive to residents’ lives and industries like tourism, agriculture, fishing and forestry, the county said. Households and businesses also face rising costs for cooling, health care, upgrades, repairs and insurance.
June 2025 marked the third year in a row the Washington State Department of Ecology issued a drought emergency, meaning that the Pierce County water supply was below 75% of the average of the last 30 years, according to the county.
“Extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States, and Pierce County is expected to experience 20 additional extreme heat days by midcentury,” staff wrote in an ordinance to modify the county’s 2030 Resilience and Climate Action Plan.
Additionally, “Pierce County has experienced unprecedented fine particle levels in the air due to wildfire smoke since 2015, resulting in the highest levels of fine particles since monitoring began in 1980.”
As previously reported by The News Tribune, Washington has seen significantly more devastating wildfires in the last decade, and since the 1990s there has been a 844% increase in annual acres burned as of 2021. The burning of fossil fuels like oil, coal and natural gas, the clearing of forests and industrialized agricultural practices has trapped greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, creating a sort of “thermal blanket,” causing global warming, as explained on the county’s website.
What is Pierce County’s plan?
The “Sustainability 2030: Pierce County’s Resilience and Climate Action Plan” calls for a 45% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 (from a 2015 baseline) to “enhance public health, improve air and water quality and support our economy.”
What does that mean in practice?
Among the county’s key sustainability goals are to conserve 100,000 acres of land and critical habitat, invest in infrastructure that will withstand flooding, wildfires and extreme heat, invest in “clean, reliable and connected transportation systems” and create “resilient, efficient and affordable buildings for homes and businesses,” per the 2025 plan update.
Some of the highlights of 2025 were: Getting feedback from 4,520 attendees at community education classes and events, assessing 33 county buildings for solar feasibility, purchasing 138 acres of land for conservation and approving more than $13.3 million of property owner clean energy projects (including renewable energy investments, electric vehicle charging, energy and water efficiency projects and seismic hardening) with C-PACER financing, according to the 2025 annual sustainability report.
The 24 new actions added to the 2026-2027 plan emphasize conserving land, protecting forests, strengthening the “green economy” in Pierce County, preparing for climate-change impacts and enhancing resiliency and creating more opportunities for community leaders to take climate action.
This story was originally published December 18, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
