Operationalizing climate justice in the implementation of Boston’s Building Performance Standard

Cities are moving toward the implementation of more just urban climate actions, but the politics and processes of operationalizing climate justice in practice remain understudied. Here we examine the implementation of climate justice through Boston’s Building Emissions Reduction and Disclosure Ordinance (BERDO), a landmark Building Performance Standard that reflects a transformative shift towards carbon neutrality in cities. We utilize a rich mixed-methods research design that is rooted in 5 months of participant observation within the City of Boston’s Environment Department, 20 expert interviews and a systematic content analysis of hundreds of policy documents. We find that implementing BERDO entails political contestation over differing conceptions of resistance and power relations around climate justice. Justice becomes subject to scope and scale discrepancies, the processes of bureaucratization and even weaponization. In documenting these tensions, we provide insights into the complex challenges that cities may face as they begin to operationalize climate justice on the ground.