The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) has released its 2024 City Clean Energy Scorecard, and this year, Portland climbed three spots to 8th place out of the 75 cities ranked.

The scorecard measures the effectiveness of efforts to increase energy efficiency and clean energy usage across major U.S. cities. The results reflect Portland’s continued focus on achieving its energy-related goals.

Leading the pack in government operations

Of the five policy areas evaluated, Portland performed the best in “local government operations,” tying Seattle for the highest score. A key factor in claiming the top spot is Portland’s management of energy use at local government facilities, which helps put the city on track to hit its government greenhouse gas emission reduction target of 53% below 2006-2007 levels by 2030.

ACEEE credited Portland with using 100% renewable energy to power its municipal buildings and using 100% LED bulbs on city streetlights. It also gave points for having 15% of the city’s fleet be energy-efficient vehicles (with a goal of 20% by 2030) and creating energy benchmarks for all its municipal buildings.

Portland’s focus on diversity and inclusion programs for procurement and contracting—including resources for contractor development and workforce training—also contributed to its leading score in the government operations category.

Portland was the second highest-scoring city in transportation policies, behind San Francisco. High marks were given for Portland’s 2020 modification to zoning code, allowing up to four units per lot in all residential districts and requiring multi-dwelling and mixed-use developments of five or more units to have electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

Though the scorecard reflects encouraging successes in some city-wide efforts to advance clean energy initiatives, it also highlights cities with significant room for improvement. Across the country, ACEEE’s analysis revealed a need to create or expand clean energy policies to address three priorities:

• Advancing racial and social equity
• Adopting building energy performance standards
• Reducing transportation energy use and greenhouse gas emissions

To learn more about this year’s scorecard and the actions needed to improve each city’s energy performance, read the ACEEE’s press release. For a broader view into energy-efficiency rankings across key sectors, check out the most recent Energy Efficiency Impact Report.