Center for Climate Change Law | Columbia Law School

Model Ordinances

The Center for Climate Change Law has launched a Model Municipal Ordinance project.  The goal of this project is to create best practices for municipal ordinances—covering green buildings, wind, and solar resources—which avoid the drafting problems and legal pitfalls that often plague other ordinances.

Current municipal ordinances vary widely in content and coverage and many municipalities cannot devote sufficient resources to form fully developed green building, wind and solar ordinances. Yet, municipalities have the ability to control many aspects of  their local land siting. Columbia's model ordinances offer a framework that can enable local governments to implement and enforce the effective and efficient use of renewable energy resources.  These model ordinances were derived from the best aspects of existing municipal ordinances.  They are designed with New York municipalities in mind, but are general enough that with minor revisions, they can be readily adopted by municipalities in other states.   
 
CCCL has drafted model ordinances for green buildings and commercial wind, and is in the process of drafting a model ordinance for residential solar. 

Comments on these model ordinances are welcome and should be sent to michael.gerrard@law.columbia.edu.

Model Municipal Green Building Ordinance and Supporting Material		Model Municipal Wind Siting Ordinance and Supporting Material		Model Small-Scale Solar Siting Ordinance and Supporting Material		Municipal Law Databases of Renewable Resources