Residents are at the edge of their seats as the cities of Claremont and Riverside compete neck and neck, logging points at a steady rate to take first place in the 2014 CoolCalifornia City Challenge.

As of Tuesday, September 9, Claremonters participating in the challenge have racked up 1,626,501 points, gaining almost 30,000 points in the five days since our last update. Riverside maintains its first place status and continues to lead the pack with 1,705,248 points.

Claremont is only 78,747 behind Riverside…we can still take them!

Residents have until Monday, September 29 at 11:59 p.m. to log on and earn points towards winning a portion of the $50,000 to be distributed between cities based on the number of points accumulated. This will be the last opportunity to enter energy and vehicle data for August.

Claremont has traded the top spot with Riverside several times over the course of the challenge despite the fact that Riverside has almost twice the number of residents participating in the program. With its 383 participants, Claremont took the lead from the city of Riverside in July.

The CoolCalifornia City Challenge was created to encourage voluntary carbon footprint reductions throughout the state and to track household greenhouse gas emissions reductions from city to city. Since April 1, participating households have been encouraged to track their energy and household vehicle emissions and join EcoTeams, groups of households working together to reduce their carbon footprints, and earn points in the program.

The city with the most points at the end of the five-month challenge period will be crowned the “Coolest California City” for 2014 at an awards ceremony at the Air Resources Board meeting in October. In addition, two runner-up cities will each earn the title of “Cool California City,” and be awarded second and third place prizes. ALL cities will receive prize money based on the percentage of overall points earned by participants in their city during the competition.

For more details about how to log and calculate points, log on to: https://coolclimate.berkeley.edu/challenge/how-do-we-calculate-points-for-the-challenge.php

—Angela Bailey

news@claremont-courier.com