At Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker, we’re continuing to experiment with ways in which residents interested in climate change issues might take part in an online conversation about how well the city’s program to fight global warming is working.

When we saw that many users seemed daunted by the prospect of becoming regular guest contributors to our group weblog, we launched a series of online forums to lower the hurdles, making it simple to take part by the tried-and-true means of one-off comments on our various forums.

Now we’ve tweaked our approach again.

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Boulder’s initative to cut greenhouse gasses has a fabulous-looking public face in the ClimateSmart web site launched last September. Only trouble is, behind the handsomely designed and info-rich site, it appears there’s virtually no “community” in this community effort!

We here at Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker certainly understand that problem. Cultivating a vibrant online community is a real beast. You may have noticed that we’ve been having a hard time with that ourselves. Still, it’s a beast that must be tamed if educational programs like Climate Smart that rely on participation and buy-in from local citizens are to truly succeed.

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The Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker project is about to have its second major growth spurt since our start-up last summer — and we’re asking you to be part of it.

Today we launch a series of online forums, and with them hope to inaugurate a vibrant discussion of the city’s unique municipal carbon tax approach. But it’ll be one that will be significantly easier for you to take part in. Check out the new discussion boards.

Our aim when we launched this project — with the help of the Knight Foundation and it’s News Challenge grant — was to see if two long-time environmental reporters could partner with local citizens to explore participatory journalism’s potential, in this case to cover a tough eco-issue like global warming, and find a local focus for a story with national and international implications. … (more…)

Want to learn more about carbon taxes in general, as well as what’s happening with carbon taxes in Boulder and elsewhere in the Rocky Mountains and the rest of the United States? We’ve compiled a helpful list of a dozen-and-a-half carbon tax and global warming resource links to get started. And this is a living list, so your suggestions for new sites are welcome — just use the comment area below. And thanks to intern Anna-Katarina Gravgaard for her help in putting together this useful resource.

The funder behind the Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker project is also behind an interesting new web site called MediaShift Idea Lab. The idea of this group blog, launched just today, is that that will allow us, and other innovative Internet projects Knight is backing with grants, to work through the lessons of our online efforts with each other and in the public eye.

As the editor Mark Glaser puts it, “Idea Lab will be a place where you can read about what innovators are doing to help reinvent community news. The dozens of authors at this new group blog — hosted by PBS.org and funded by the Knight Foundation — have received grants from Knight in their 21st Century News Challenge, and are going to report first-hand on the status of their projects.” How’s that for transparency?

Check out our first entries on Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker– a blog post about our initial progress with the project, and another about some lessons learned. And there’ll be more to come, if you want some insight about the development of the project itself.

Just a quick update — summertime chaos has hit. Multiple deadlines and business travel coupled with a minor crisis has kept me from updating this blog for the last week. Meanwhile, Adam Glenn is wrapping up a big project. So this site has been quiet. Sorry about that, folks.

A lot has been happening on this issue, and I’ll be posting soon to catch everyone up. Also, we’ve got some new volunteers who should be posting next week or shortly thereafter.

I have some correspondence from the city which I will catch you up to date on tomorrow. Thanks everyone for your patience.

Today’s Daily Camera features two editorials by associate editor Clint Talbott on Boulder’s latest greenhouse gas emissions inventory.

In Open that Database!, Talbott supports and amplifies my earlier request for the complete emission inventory database from the city. (Thanks!) Regarding the city’s claim that this database is proprietary, he wrote:

“In diplomatic terms, Gahran objected to the denial, arguing that the full inventory is a public document. She is right. The data upon which the city will measure the progress of its tax-funded emissions program is clearly a matter of public concern. It should be treated as a matter of public record.”

As I noted this morning, we seem to be making progress toward getting access to that inventory — not direct access at this point, but the city is will to supply data in answer to specific questions. That’s a start, and it’s my impression that the city intends to work with us on that in good faith.

However, I still intend to push for direct access to the database. I explained that in a comment I posted to Talbott’s first editorial… (more…)

ChicagoEye, via Flickr (CC License)

Anyone can think more like a reporter, without necessarily having to look like one!

A community journalism project is, by definition, a collective venture. To truly succeed, knowledge gained by some has to find its way across to the whole group.

That’s why we, the founders of Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker, want to share with you some of our perspective about journalistic practice, along with guidelines for contributors to this group effort.

Over time, with your help, we hope to improve and expand on these key points, and add more.

Read on, and please share your own thoughts and questions…

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Amy Gahran

Electrician and entrepreneur Jeff Jones, wiring up my Saver Switch today.

Several weeks ago, Xcel Energy called me to see if I wanted to sign up for their Saver Switch program. That’s when they install a remote-controlled switch on my outdoor central air conditioning unit, which they use to cycle my cooling off for up to 15 minutes at a time on up to 15 hot summer days per year. This helps the utility manage peak electricity demand and hopefully avoid blackouts or brownouts. For that, I get a $25 credit on my September or October utility bill each year I have the switch.

That sounded like free money to me, so I said sure! Today, my Saver Switch finally was installed.

The installer was Jeff Jones, an electrician with Hunt Electric (Xcel’s installation contractor). I had a great conversation with Jeff — turns out he’s got a local business that specializes in renewable energy and off-grid solutions for residential and commercial buildings. He’s trying to convince the state of Colorado to offer more incentives for developers to include renewable measures like photovoltaics in new-construction housing developments. He also dabbles in biofuels, especially ethanol-powered vehicles.

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As the Boulder Carbon Tax Tracker project picks up steam, people in Boulder and elsewhere will probably want to follow the action. We’ve made that easy by offering free daily e-mail alerts and simple feed subscriptions.

Sign up to receive our e-mail alerts by entering your e-mail address in the form on the right sidebar of the home page.

Just below our e-mail signup form, you can click to subscribe to our RSS feed in any of several popular feed readers. If your feed reader isn’t there, just add this feed to your subscription list: http://feeds.feedburner.com/BoulderCarbonTaxTracker