Do you think of cutting-edge sustainability efforts when you think of Greater Cincinnati? If you believe a new ranking by Site Selection Magazine, you should.
For the second year in a row, the Greater Cincinnati metropolitan area landed at the top of the corporate real estate and economic development magazine's list of cities pursuing environmental sustainability in the context of business and industry.
The magazine lauded the city's 2018 Green Cincinnati Plan and its goals of cutting the city's carbon emissions by 80 percent over the next 32 years. It also, of course, touched on corporate sustainability efforts by consumer goods giant Procter & Gamble, including its "Ambition 2030" plan.
"If we follow this comprehensive blueprint, it will benefit our economy, our health, our ability to attract talent, and of course the environment that we'll pass along to our children," Councilmember P.G.Sittenfeld told the magazine about the Green Cincinnati Plan.
Criteria for the rankings included number and percentage of buildings per capita meeting environmental benchmarks like LEED and Energy Star certification (Cincinnati ranked 19th), number of green industry initiatives (Cincinnati ranked 6th), brownfield clean-ups and rankings in sustainability and quality-of-life indexes, including the Gallup/Healthways Well-Being rankings.
The Chicago, Boston, Seattle and San Diego metro areas rounded out the top five in the rankings, and Cincinnati peer cities Louisville (No. 7) and Pittsburgh (No. 10) also showed up in the top 10.
“Cincinnati’s sustainability efforts continue to gain national and international attention," Mayor John Cranley said in a statement about the rankings. "It has become clear that cities and local municipalities will lead the global effort to fight climate change, and Cincinnati is on the front lines. I am encouraged by the changes we are making, but we have a lot of work left to do.”
