Global Green NOLA

Global Green is a national leader in advancing sustainable and resilient communities. We green cities, schools, and affordable housing to help protect human health, improve livability and support our planet's natural systems in an effort to stem climate change. Through various programs focusing on green urbanism, infrastructure, community education and resilience, Global Green is working to foster a global value shift toward a sustainable and secure future for all.

The Community and Climate Action Center is a hub for educational opportunities with a focus on climate change, environmental equity and coastal resilience. It is located in the Holy Cross neighborhood of New Orleans' Lower 9th Ward.

The space is a 6,000 square foot building built to LEED standards and is available to groups for workshops, educational, and community-based events. Global Green works with numerous partners to bring programming to the CCAC. The CCAC has hosted local, regional, national and international groups since opening its doors in October 2018. The CCAC is an ideal venue for sharing mitigation and adaptation strategies for climate impacts with coastal communities and other geographies along the Gulf and worldwide.

The Lower 9th Ward is an historically underserved community that was densely settled with single and multifamily and small businesses before Hurricane Katrina. Pre-storm, the area had one of the city's highest homeownership rates. Fifteen years after the storm, entire blocks still sit vacant and overgrown. The neighborhood is 60% African-American (98% pre-Katrina) with $32,486 average household income.

The CCAC houses a green building resource information station and is developing capacity to offer additional community resources. Climate change is significantly impacting people and industries in the Greater New Orleans region, but there is a lack of community understanding and tangible opportunities for taking action. The Community & Climate Action Center will serve as a hub for communication around solutions to climate change through mitigation and adaptation planning. The Center aims to create powerful connections, and empower communities to take their own steps in climate action.

In the event of a natural or man-made disaster, the center doubles as a first response and rapid return location to be used by first responders. The building's structure allows high wind and water resistance, as well as solar power with battery back-up to provide essential electrical services such as lighting, refrigeration for medication, cell phone charging and communications.

Global Green is designing and building Integral Climate Parks to serve as demonstration projects for this innovative model of solving climate change. Each park will repair local ecosystem habitats, including renewal of soil, water and air, and provide peace and recreation for its neighbors. The first park in New Orleans will be on the grounds of the CCAC. The second - full-scale - Climate Park will be in the surrounding community and along the adjacent Bayou Bienvenue which is being restored.

Climate Parks were designed to: Raise awareness about climate change and sustainability strategies by engaging with communities in addressing climate change. Desired impacts of climate parks in the Lower 9th Ward are to reduce flooding and subsequent damage to surrounding buildings in the community. Building multiple Climate Parks along the Gulf Coast and throughout the rest of the country would result in significant reduction in flooding, insurance payments and blight, which would increase food security, jobs, and affordable potable water.