Question:
You are given the full text of a scientific research paper.

    Summarize the study’s **policy implications**—how the research findings can inform policy or decision-making. Your response should:
    - Interpret what the results suggest for governments, regulators, or institutions
    - Highlight potential actions, strategies, or decisions informed by the study
    - Use policy-appropriate language without speculation beyond the study’s conclusions
    - Be clear, practical, and informative

    Write a short paragraph for the “Policy Implications” section of a policy brief.

    Scientific Research Paper:
    Nature Cities | Volume 1 | October 2024 | 665–676
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nature cities
https://doi.org/10.1038/s44284-024-00121-w
Article
Operationalizing climate justice in the
implementation of Boston’s Building
Performance Standard
Claudia V. Diezmartínez

, Benjamin K. Sovacool & Anne G. Short Gianotti

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.
Cities are now taking the lead in implementing just urban transitions—
fair and equitable transitions toward low-carbon and resilient urban
societies1,2. Given the global push towards urbanization into metro
politan areas3, and the devolution of some authority in climate deci-
sion-making to subnational actors, cities have been leaders in climate
action for over two decades4–6. More recently, city governments have
been increasingly recognizing the connections between climate change
and social justice, and making headway with the integration of justice
and equity concerns into climate plans and policy implementation
tools7–9. However, these efforts have been met with questions about
whether and how cities will take just climate action from planning
into practice.
Scholars have repeatedly criticized the gaps between the rhetoric
and reality of urban climate action10–13, which we define here as poli-
cies and programs to mitigate and adapt to climate change. However,
existing literature has focused primarily on either analysing the devel-
opment of plans, policies and targets or evaluating the post-facto
outcomes of cities’ programs2,11,12,14–18. This collective scholarship has
revealed multiple barriers to urban climate action, from funding con-
straints and limited capacities to lack of political will and issues of
authority16,19,20. These barriers result in, at best, insufficient reductions
in greenhouse gas emissions21 and, at worst, the exacerbation of climate
vulnerabilities and injustice in cities22–25.
Although cities purportedly continue to underdeliver on climate
action and justice, the politics and dynamics of policy implementa-
tion—the process through which city governments translate goals
and plans into operational and enforceable programs—remain under
studied14,15,26. Rather than recognizing the complexities of operation-
alizing climate action, existing theory suggests that either unique
“configurations” of enabling factors16 or the mere removal of barriers
should enable cities to successfully implement climate policies19,27.
This thinking obscures the “politics and contested nature of low car-
bon urbanism”28 and hinders the analysis of policy implementation
through political and justice lenses15,27, with scholars ultimately failing
to address how the “recognition of socially vulnerable groups either
carries through or drops out of the policy implementation process”18.
Received: 24 March 2024
Accepted: 6 August 2024
Published online: 13 September 2024
 Check for updates
Department of Earth and Environment, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA.
 e-mail: cvdiezm@bu.edu

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The history and implementation process of BERDO
The implementation of BERDO began shortly after the adoption of
the ordinance with the launch of rule-making (Fig. 1a). City officials
described the goal of rule-making as “creating clarity” for building own-
ers on how to implement different compliance mechanisms to achieve
emissions reductions (Table 1) and to define how justice mandates that
were embedded in the ordinance (Table 2) work “not just in concept but
in action”. Regulations were adopted in three phases. Each phase was
dedicated to specific regulatory topics and included the engagement
of multiple actors (Fig. 1b).
To operationalize climate justice, city staff simultaneously sought
(1) to elevate community voices in regulatory decisions through the
formation of a Community Advisory Group (CAG) that consists of com-
munity advocates and leaders working on environmental justice, social
justice, affordable housing and climate action and (2) to maintain the
buy-in of the regulated parties that are subject to BERDO, including real
estate, hospitals, universities and other building owners (Fig. 1b). The
convening of a justice-centered CAG for rule-making was also unique
to BERDO compared with other existing BPS programs. However,
unlike the Review Board, which has decision-making authorities in
multiple aspects of implementation, the CAG served in an advisory
role specifically in the rule-making process.
CAG members met regularly with city officials to advise on how
to align regulatory and implementation decisions with justice ideals
and community priorities. For city staff, the CAG provided a space to
“explicitly talk about equity” and enable “ground truthing” with com-
munity leaders that have “true expertise and what is needed or wanted
in a community”. The CAG also provided a buttress against opposition
for regulatory decisions that were designed for justice, as stated by a
city official: “we had the backup to say ‘we are talking to community
members, and this is a concern that’s being brought up’”. CAG members
described their role as representing the needs of their neighborhoods,
to ensure that implementation “was aligned with equity” and does not
disproportionately burden vulnerable communities, while making
sure that BERDO “had teeth” and guardrails against “the tricks” that
building owners may use to circumvent obligations. Perceptions from
CAG members about this process are summarized in Fig. 2.
Whereas CAG members provided direction for incorporating
justice in rule-making, city staff saw engaging with regulated parties
as an important component of fulfilling justice goals in the long term.
As one city official stated: “we need to bring all building owners along
in this process to actually see building decarbonization happen”.
Regulated parties engaged in rule-making through public comment
letters, public hearings and ad hoc meetings with city officials. In
this regard, city officials explained that “having a clear process for
hearing and responding to feedback was really important”. “People
notice that, and it matters. Even if they’re not all going to be happy
with exactly where you ended up, they understand how you got there
and felt like they weren’t left out of the process” and it “builds some
goodwill with stakeholders, even when we weren’t taking all of their
recommendations”.
Beyond rule-making, implementing the early stages of BERDO also
involved operationalizing the procedural and recognitional aspects of
justice in everyday decisions and practices (see definitions in Methods).
This included managing the reporting and third-party verification pro-
cesses, a help desk, outreach and education for building owners and the
Review Board’s nomination and seating process. Through these pro-
cesses, city officials sought to implement justice by (1) creating resources
to help with “getting everyone subject to BERDO across the finish line”
for reporting and emissions compliance and by (2) giving “time, atten-
tion, and resources towards under-resourced residents and owners”.
Justice contestations in policy implementation
Rule-making not only set the groundwork for BERDO but also
provided a forum for CAG members and regulated parties to contest
Here we examine the politics and processes through which city
governments operationalize climate action and climate justice (see
definition in Methods) via a case study of Boston’s Building Perfor-
mance Standard (BPS), one of the latest policy approaches for build-
ing decarbonization in the United States. Buildings are often one of
the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions in urban areas29,30,
accounting for about 37% of global energy-related carbon emissions
and more than 34% of direct energy consumption31. Energy efficiency
is one of the most common climate interventions across cities world-
wide6,32, and the mitigation sector for which US cities articulate justice
concerns most frequently7. Existing policies, however, have produced
only marginal improvements in building energy intensity33. Energy
demand and emissions from buildings have continued to increase
globally, and few local efforts are aligned with achieving net-zero
operational emissions from buildings33.
As one the first BPS programs adopted in the United States,
Boston’s Building Emissions Reduction and Disclosure Ordinance
(BERDO) represents a radical shift in building decarbonization.
BERDO is an ordinance (local law) adopted in 2021 that mandates
large residential buildings (with 15 or more units) and commercial
buildings (≥20,000 ft2/1,858 m2) in Boston to progressively reduce their
greenhouse gas emissions to reach net-zero by 2050. BERDO requires
the building owners (1) to report their annual energy and water use,
(2) to verify reported data through a third party on a regular basis and
(3) to reduce their annual emissions below an emissions standard that
corresponds to their building-use type(s). Reporting and third-party
verification have been required for all buildings since 2022. Emis-
sions compliance begins in 2025 for larger buildings (≥35 units or
≥35,000 ft2/3,251 m2) and in 2030 for smaller buildings (15–34 units
or 20,000–34,999 ft2/1,858–3,252 m2). BERDO is lauded for being
one of the few existing BPS programs that explicitly incorporates
justice mandates within its ordinance. This includes the creation of a
community-driven Review Board that has substantial decision-making
authority over the implementation of the program, and the establish-
ment of the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund to support building
decarbonization projects that benefit environmental justice communi-
ties. Whereas other BPS programs include committees with advisory
functions (for example, New York City has an Advisory Board for
Local Law 97), BERDO is unique in its delegation of implementation
powers to a resident-driven Review Board that provides permanent
community oversight over the program.
We investigate the first two years of implementation of the BERDO
program with a particular focus on rule-making, the process through
which the City of Boston developed rules and regulations for imple-
menting and enforcing BERDO. We use a mixed-methods approach
that combines 5 months of participant observation within the City of
Boston’s Environment Department, 20 interviews with city staff and
community leaders involved in the implementation of BERDO and a
systematic content analysis of over 200 policy documents related to
rule-making. We find that policy implementation served as an impor-
tant site of political contestation and resistance around climate justice.
Contestations about justice, equity and fairness were mobilized by
different actors to advance their interests in rule-making, ultimately
shaping the implementation of BERDO itself. We provide insights into
the complex challenges that cities may face as they begin to operation-
alize climate justice on the ground, and argue for a shift in scholarship
to politicize policy implementation and reframe climate justice as a
practice that continues beyond policy planning.
Results
Drawing from our mixed-methods research design (Methods), we
organize our analytical insights according to three core themes: (1) the
history and implementation process of BERDO, (2) contested climate
justice claims that arise during implementation and (3) challenges in
translating climate justice from theory into practice.

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and reinterpret the justice goals and mandates that are embedded in
the ordinance. These justice contestations concentrated on (1) distribu-
tive justice, (2) procedural justice and (3) justice as recognition (Fig. 3)
(see definitions in Methods).
Whereas the BERDO program may produce impacts at multiple
scales, contestations about the distribution of benefits and burdens
centered primarily on building owners, tenants and environmental
justice communities in Boston. CAG members generally advocated for
removing perceived regulatory loopholes that would enable building
owners to avoid or delay compliance, rely on compliance mechanisms
that do not provide localized benefits or pass burdens onto tenants
through increases in rent charges or energy bills. As explained in a
BERDO
adopted
Nov
Mar
Dec
Feb
Jan
Apr
May
Jun
Feb
Oct
Jan
Nov
Dec
Sep
Aug
Jul
Mar
Jul
Apr
Jun
May
Aug
Sep
Oct
Nov
2022
2023
Public technical working sessions
Meetings with CAG
Meetings with Boston residents
Public hearings of the BERDO Review Board
First reporting and
third-party verification deadline
Second reporting
deadline
Oct
2021
Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 3
Rule-making
finalizes
Rule-making
begins
Public listening sessions
Public hearings of the Boston Air Pollution Control Comission
Dec
2023
Informal public comment period
for regulations proposals
Formal public comment period
for draft regulations
*  Ad hoc meetings with regulated
   parties were conducted throughout
   the rule-making process
Review Board
created
a    BERDO rule-making process
b    Key actors in the implementation of BERDO
Review Board
Six members nominated by
community-based organizations
Two members nominated by
any individual or organization
One city councilor
• Oversees implementation of BERDO
• Issues penalties and fines
• Makes funding decisions for the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund
• Approves flexibility measures and sets conditions of approval
• Recommends updates to regulations and policies
• Comply with BERDO
• Engage and provide public comments on rule-making
• Nominate Review Board members
• Provide direct advice on rule-making to city oficials
• Engage and provide public comments on rule-making
• Engage Boston residents in rule-making process
• Nominate Review Board members as
  community-based organizations
• Nominate at least two-thirds
  of the Review Board members
CAG
Regulated
parties
Non-profit
afordable
housing
Social justice
advocacy
Environmental justice
advocacy
Climate advocacy
Universities
Real estate
Hospitals
Cultural
institutions
Other building
owners
Boston
community-based
organizations
Nominate
Nominate
Nominate
Fig. 1 | BERDO rule-making process and key actors. a, Rule-making consisted of
three phases. Phase 1 set rules for reporting and third-party verification. Phase 2
set rules related to the Review Board, emissions factors, compliance mechanisms
associated with renewable energy and other administrative regulations. Phase
3 set rules related to flexibility measures, the Equitable Emissions Investment
Fund and penalties and fines. Symbols are used to represent public comment
periods and different engagement components that were part of the rule-
making process. b, Key actors in the implementation of BERDO include the CAG,
regulated parties and the Review Board. All CAG members are community-based
organizations and some (non-profit affordable housing) are also regulated
parties. Community-based organizations nominate at least two-thirds of the
Review Board.

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comment letter from CAG members: “we are concerned that the ben-
efits of BERDO compliance (for example, building improvements,
improved air quality or jobs) may not adequately reach those in envi-
ronmental justice populations, and that the burdens of compliance
(for example, financial costs or displacement) may be inequitably
shouldered by those same populations”.
Regulated parties rarely advocated for the creation of additional
benefits or the distribution of existing benefits. Most of their requests
were related to providing flexibility for building owners and mini-
mizing costs and regulatory burdens, often arguing that regulations
would “unfairly”, “unduly” or “overly” burden them. In some instances,
regulated parties were reluctant to accept regulations that mandated
building owners to distribute benefits in the community. In public feed-
back related to conditions of approval for flexibility measures, some
regulated parties argued that distributing benefits such as housing
and energy affordability, health and climate resilience “are outside the
scope of emissions reductions in covered buildings” and “go beyond
the intent of the BERDO ordinance”. In other cases, regulated parties
mobilized the idea of environmental justice benefits to advance regula-
tory decisions that favor them. For example, in public comment letters
regarding the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund, some regulated
parties pushed for the prioritization of projects that produce larger
emissions reductions as this “is the greatest benefit to environmental
justice and all populations”. Such a decision is likely to favor applica-
tions from larger carbon-intensive institutions as opposed to more
holistic projects that benefit the community in other ways.
Contestations about procedural justice largely revolved around
the Review Board, which has substantial authority in the implemen-
tation of BERDO (Table 2). Regulated parties sought to strengthen
their representation in the Review Board by urging the city to select
members with technocratic expertise and expand the definition of
“community-based organizations” (which can nominate two-thirds
of the Review Board) to include the business community. Unsuccess-
ful in these efforts, regulated parties then advocated for regulations
that would limit the Review Board’s discretion, give them access to
the Review Board through working groups or enable owners to easily
appeal Review Board decisions.
By contrast, CAG members supported giving power to the Review
Board, although it proved challenging to balance maintaining the
Review Board’s discretion versus outlining decision-making processes
with prescriptive justice measures. CAG members also advocated for
tenants and residents to have a voice in Review Board processes and
regulatory decision-making, which led to additional meetings with
Boston residents during rule-making. Whereas both regulated par-
ties and CAG members supported some monitoring and disclosure
requirements, only the CAG focused on tracking environmental justice
metrics and implementing outreach and education efforts beyond
building owners.
Contestations about distributive and procedural justice revealed
underlying debates about who is recognized as vulnerable and deserv-
ing of justice under BERDO. Although BERDO regulates all types of
building owners, CAG members largely focused on restricting the
behavior of landlords and large institutions, sometimes overlooking
the burdens placed on other building owners. Some CAG members
pushed for more nuanced discussions and highlighted how certain
owners are also vulnerable. As stated in a CAG meeting: “if we want
justice, justice is not just displacing burdens on private owners”. This
statement frames building owners as subjects of justice and challenges
the assumption that protecting tenants at the expense of owners is
always just. Whereas CAG members generally agreed on prioritizing
benefits to environmental justice populations, communities of color,
tenants and low- and moderate-income residents, specifics about how
to operationalize such priorities were often contested. For instance,
when discussing the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund, some sug-
gested that money should only be directed to environmental justice
neighborhoods and were wary of including “geographic equity” as
a part of the Review Board’s funding criteria, fearing that this would
channel resources to wealthier neighborhoods. Others argued that
regulations should recognize the differences between environmental
justice neighborhoods, and that projects in “wealthy” communities can
also serve vulnerable residents. Reflecting on issues of recognition, a
city official commented: “I have a specific responsibility to even the
scales for folks at the margins because they’ve historically been uncared
for, but that doesn’t need to express itself as callousness or disregard to
those in the middle. […] In this role, I don’t think it is right or ethically
just for me to just not care about people. That is a practice of dehu-
manization and is a big problem within our movements too. I would
like us to get to the point where we lack the ability to demonize anyone”.
Although justice contestations featured prominently in regula-
tions related to BERDO’s justice components (Table 2), concerns about
justice were also mobilized in regulatory topics that are not commonly
associated with justice and/or without an explicit justice mandate that
emanates from the ordinance. For instance, concerns about asthma
in children and air pollution in communities of color were mobilized
by CAG members to support the assignment of an emissions factor to
fossil fuel-derived district steam. This decision was opposed by some
regulated parties, who argued that such rule places an “unfair financial
burden” and “disproportionately burdens district steam customers”.
In advocating to restrict the use of PPAs, CAG members argued that
despite existing challenges in renewable energy markets, “we can-
not allow the current reality to further entrench existing inequity
at the expense of environmental justice populations”. Conversely,
regulated parties argued that relaxing third-party verification require-
ments to enable in-house data verification would be “a key workforce
Table 1 | BERDO compliance mechanisms
Compliance
mechanism
Description
Direct emissions
reductions in
buildings
Owners may directly reduce emissions from
electricity and fossil fuel consumption through
building retrofitting and fuel switching. This includes
improvements such as upgrading to high-efficiency
electric appliances and lighting, the electrification of
heating, cooling and cooking systems, insulation and
building-envelope improvements
Enrollment into
Boston’s municipal
aggregation
program
Owners and tenants may reduce emissions from
electricity consumption by enrolling into Boston’s
Community Choice Electricity program, a municipal
aggregation program through which the City of Boston
purchases Massachusetts (MA) Class I Renewable
Energy Certificates (RECs) on behalf of customers
Local renewable
energy generation
Owners may reduce emissions from electricity
consumption through renewable energy generation
located on-site (for example, rooftop solar) or off-
site (for example, community solar, Power Purchase
Agreements (PPAs) in the ISO New England grid)
Eligible RECs
Owners may mitigate emissions from electricity
consumptions by either purchasing and retiring
unbundled MA Class I RECs or purchasing and retiring
bundled MA Class I RECs as part of a PPA in the ISO
New England grid
Eligible PPAs
Owners may mitigate emissions from electricity
consumption by entering into a long-term energy
contract with a generator of non-emitting renewable
energy that is located outside the ISO New England
grid. The PPA must meet an “additionality” requirement,
and associated RECs must be retired as part of the PPA
Alternative
Compliance
Payments (ACPs)
Owners may mitigate emissions from electricity and
fossil fuel consumption through ACPs. ACPs are priced
at US$234 for every metric ton of CO2-equivalent
emitted above the emissions standards. ACPs are not
fines, but rather a compliance pathway

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development opportunity” that “would create a powerful incentive for
large existing buildings to hire energy efficiency experts long term”.
These examples show how justice contestations appear in seemingly
opaque or technical decisions and beyond spaces that are explicitly
labeled for justice. As one city official explained, even where the ordi-
nance does not specifically require it, “regulations can still accommo-
date additional thoughts on what it means to advance equity goals”.
Even though CAG members and regulated parties were not always
successful in influencing implementation decisions via mobilizing
ideas of justice, justice contestations came to define how the City of
Boston operationalized climate justice and shaped the implementation
of BERDO itself. This could be seen in the evolution of the rule-making
process with the addition of meetings with Boston residents and
additional public comment periods as a result of requests from the
CAG and regulated parties. Contestations were also reflected in the
final rule-making language, which was drafted and revised to resonate
with multiple, and sometimes conflicting, justice ideals that were
mobilized throughout the process (Fig. 4).
Challenges in translating climate justice into practice
Interviewees identified several common barriers to policy implementa-
tion in BERDO, including capacity and budget constraints, technical
complexity, uncertainty and data quality/availability. However, we
found that additional distinctive challenges stemmed from the pursuit
of implementing climate justice itself. We categorized these challenges
into (1) scope and scale discrepancies, (2) the bureaucratization of
justice and (3) the weaponizing of justice.
The first challenge in implementing climate justice is that it
inherently requires action at multiple scales and beyond the scope
of a single program. As stated by an interviewee, “the ordinance was
reflective of some community priorities and goals that would never
really be able to be addressed through just BERDO alone”. In addi-
tion to the legal constraints attached to any given program, scope
and scale discrepancies partially originate from the multiplicity of
meanings of justice. For some, operationalizing justice in BERDO
meant implementing the program in a way that avoids harm and dis-
tributes benefits inherently produced by building decarbonization.
For others, justice also meant “increasing the pot of benefits that are
on the table and then distributing those”, potentially crossing the
legal scope of BERDO.
This issue was best exemplified in discussions about gentrifi-
cation and displacement, with advocates persistently pushing for
BERDO to include tenant protections. For context, the majority of
Boston’s households (65%) are renters34. Across Greater Boston,
65% of Black residents and 70% of Latinx residents are renters (com-
pared with only 33% of White residents), and more than half of the
area’s renters are cost-burdened35. Symptoms of green gentrification
have already been reported in Boston and found to be associated
with urban greening, climate initiatives and redevelopment strate-
gies36,37. With over 80% of Boston’s census blocks considered to be
“environmental justice populations”38, a great portion of BERDO
buildings are located in, and impact the lives of, multiple vulnerable
communities (Supplementary Appendix A). In this landscape, the
implementation of BERDO may be perceived, rightly or wrongly,
as another installment in patterns of historical marginalization.
Although BERDO includes a goal that is related to housing justice
(Table 2), municipalities in Massachusetts lack the authority to insti-
tute rent control. Therefore, BERDO offered limited avenues for inte-
grating blanket rent stabilization measures and tenant protections
during rule-making. This example showcases how, even if a policy is
explicitly designed with a justice lens and where city staff and advo-
cates agree on principles such as “climate justice is housing justice”,
individual climate programs may not always have the scale or scope
for operationalizing those goals.
Scope and scale discrepancies were omnipresent throughout
rule-making, with BERDO implementation serving as a battleground
for multiple issues that could not be directly or fully addressed through
this program, from evictions and slow permitting processes to the
marketing of renewable natural gas in the Northeastern US. This often
led to tensions, and some CAG members felt that they were unable to
“set the agenda” during rule-making (Fig. 2). Some members explained
that “making the regulations was not always in line with what the group
wanted to talk about” and “the response that ‘we can’t do anything
about rent control because that’s a state issue’ is really unsatisfying
for people and can be really disempowering”. Such frustrations were
illustrated in a statement during a public meeting: “we keep talking
about buildings and not people”.
The second challenge in translating climate justice into practice is
that it necessitates the bureaucratization or standardization of justice
goals into concrete processes, measures or criteria. This creates the
risk of reducing justice to box-checking or scoring exercises that do
not fully reflect justice ideals. As one city official explained “[Before]
I understood environmental justice as a way to dismantle power and
distribute power, [but] to write policy, you have to write environmental
Table 2 | Key justice components embedded in the BERDO
program
Component
Description
Goal
To “reduce the emissions of air pollutants, including
greenhouse gases, from building energy production and
consumption, and thereby to encourage efficient use of
energy and water, develop further investment in building a
green economy, including by encouraging the hiring and
training of green jobs, protect public health, and promote
equitable access to housing”
Review Board
A nine-member independent board that provides
community oversight over the implementation of BERDO.
Two-thirds of the Review Board (six members) must be
nominated by community-based organizations. One
seat is reserved by the Chair of Boston City Council’s
Environmental Justice, Resiliency, and Parks Committee.
Two seats may be nominated by anyone. The Review
Board has the authority to make funding decisions for the
Equitable Emissions Investment Fund, approve and set
conditions for flexibility measures requested by owners,
enforce the ordinance, issue penalties and fines, propose
updates to emissions standards and the price of ACPs,
and recommend revisions to regulations and compliance
mechanisms
Equitable
Emissions
Investment
Fund
A special purpose fund that collects all ACPs (Table 1)
and fines made pursuant to BERDO. The Review Board
makes funding decisions, provided that the fund must
be used to support local building carbon abatement
projects in Boston and must prioritize projects that benefit
environmental justice communities and populations who
are disproportionately affected by air pollution
Flexibility
measures with
conditions of
approval
Owners may apply to obtain flexibility in complying
with emissions standards. Flexibility measures must be
approved by the Review Board, and the Review Board may
set conditions of approval, including conditions related to
environmental justice. Flexibility measures include:
• Building Portfolios, which enable owners to comply with
a single emissions standard across a group (‘portfolio’)
of buildings that share the same owner or Institutional
Master Plan (a development plan that is approved by the
Boston Planning & Development Agency)
• Individual Compliance Schedules, which enable owners
to request an alternative emissions reduction based on
a baseline year. Individual Compliance Schedules must
establish absolute emissions limits that decline every
five years on a linear basis or better. On the basis of their
selected baseline year, owners must achieve a 50%
reduction in absolute emissions by 2030 and a 100%
reduction by 2050
• Hardship Compliance Plans, which enable owners to
request alternative emissions standards and/or emissions
reduction schedules if facing an eligible hardship in
complying with the default emissions standards

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justice in a measurable, actionable way, […] which it’s not the way the
people really talk about it”. This can be seen in environmental jus-
tice assessments that rank initiatives based on a limited set of justice
metrics or in definitions and indexes of environmental justice com-
munities, which, despite compiling multiple socio-demographic vari-
ables, may not always accurately reflect who the local residents actually
perceive as vulnerable within their city. Justice is in many ways impervi-
able to codification. As stated by a city official: “I don’t think you can
100% ever codify justice. There are some things like love, which I believe
has to be a critical component to how we live in the world, and how
am I supposed to write that? How do we do this with love and grace?”.
The bureaucratization of justice is not only driven by the state’s
need to standardize rules and processes. Rather, it can be purposefully
or inadvertendly promoted by myriad actors. For instance, bureauc-
ratization can come from regulated parties who are seeking to limit
justice and demanding to constrain justice-oriented decision-making
“I think that the frustration of the group was that [the process] was on the timeline of having to
promulgate the regulations, instead of stepping back and saying to the group ‘what are the
major issues that you want to talk about?’”
“I got the impression that some people on the CAG really wanted [the process] to be more
bottom-up than it was. But it was much more bottom-up than other people even tried to do, and
I think it became more bottom-up as people gave feedback about how the meetings were going”
Top-down
“It was really an experiment on how to have policy-making and a regulatory process be more collaborative”
“The fact that we were able to bring in the perspectives of people who otherwise would not have had
their feedback heard, whether or not it was incorporated, is important and meaningful”
“The fact that the city engaged a group in this advisory board was unique”
New and unique
“I think the city was very open and willing to learn”
“I found [the process] to be very thoughtful and intentional”
“I love that the city made a huge efort to include people in every community, and it's really open and
willing to talk to people.”
“I think [the city] really make an efort to make sure that stakeholders in EJ communities fully participate
in it, and I can say that we try our best to fully participate”
“I found the CAG process to be very organized. The fact that there was a repository of documents [...],
the determination of the city oficials to be present at the meetings [...], they had ofice hours.
If you wanted to talk to someone, you could talk to someone”
Open and intentional
“This whole process to get community input was very structured and clear”
“This is a great model and other cities should do that”
“Engagement is, I think, the most important thing that has happened”
“I can see my participation in the regulations”
Impactful
“We can see in the regulations, where the community voice has been integrated. Did we get to community
ownership? I don't think so, but I think this is a much better place than before”
“As an advisory group member, it was challenging. It's just so much information. I think we really
would have benefited from some in-person longer session meetings”
“The city heard things that we didn't hear from other people, and they also had to make decisions
that are based on things that we may not have been aware. So that felt frustrating”
“One of the biggest challenges that I felt throughout the process was being able to break down
and explain what a lot of these highly technical policies mean and what they would actually
like result in”
Complex
“I know that it's easier said than done when it comes to public processes, but even more time
would have been better. You got to go slow to go fast and build trust”
“I think that the city did the best it could in the situation [...] you've got to be moving things along
at a pace, whereas the group didn't always feel informed or understanding what was going on”
“We were under a tight timeline to come up with the content of the regulations”
“It was a rushed process because of its timeline”
Quick
“It was a very collaborative process”
“I didn't feel like I was working against the city in any way. I really felt like we were working together and
that we wanted the same things”
Collaborative
“I never felt there was anybody trying to hide anything. It was pretty transparent”
Fig. 2 | Perceptions of CAG process. Summary of perceptions from members about the process and approach of the CAG. Data come from interviews with CAG
members. EJ, environmental justice.

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Health and
quality of life
Building owners
Building tenants
Environmental justice communities
Boston residents
Communities outside Boston
and near power plants and
gas infrastructure
Energy justice
(reduced energy
burdens, access to
heating and cooling)
New green jobs and
workforce development
Climate change
mitigation
Global community
Direct compliance costs
and regulatory burdens
Energy injustice
(increased energy
burdens)
Gentrification
and displacement
Who should benefit and how?
Who should be protected from burdens and how?
What benefits
should be distributed?
What burdens should be
minimized or avoided?
Definition of community-based organization
Opportunity to convene a
Review Board working group
Opportunity to provide public comment
for Review Board decisions
Opportunity to appeal
Review Board decisions
Procedural justice: contestations about power, representation and accountability
Who can nominate Review Board members?
Who has access to the Review Board and
their decision-making processes and how?
How much discretion should the Review Board have?
Requirements or guidelines to make decisions
related to flexibility measures
Review Board
Who is represented in the Review Board?
Nominated by community-based organizations
Nominated by any individual or institution
City councilor, Chair of the Environmental Justice,
Resiliency, and Parks Committee
Requirements related to expertise
and/or sector representation
Requirements or guidelines to make decisions
related to the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund
Distributive justice: contestations about the distribution of benefits and burdens
Who is the Review Board and the
City of Boston accountable to and how?
Monitoring and disclosure requirements
Education and outreach
Justice as recognition: contestations about who is recognized as vulnerable and deserving of justice
Building owners
Environmental
justice communities
Building tenants
Lanlords
Large institutions
Low-income owners
Moderate-income owners
Condominium owners
Small businesses
Cultural institutions
Any owner
Low-income tenants
Moderate-income tenants
Small-business tenants
Any tenant
Oficially recognized environmental justice
neighborhoods
Vulnerable residents in any neighborhood
Fig. 3 | Justice contestations in the rule-making process of BERDO. Different actors framed and mobilized multiple contestations around ideals of justice, equity
and fairness to advance their interests and shape the implementation decisions. Contestations focused on issues of distributive justice, procedural justice and justice
as recognition.

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to ‘objective’ or ‘data-based scoring systems’. It can also come well-
intentioned advocates who are seeking to further justice but pushing
for blanket justice requirements that may serve a purpose in some
contexts but are ill-fitting in others. Both approaches bureaucratize
justice, either by forcing its objectification and quantification or by
reducing it to for-the-sake-of-it mandates.
Additional challenges emerge when justice is weaponized to stall,
impede or co-opt implementation. Throughout rule-making, some CAG
members and regulated parties pushed for implementation delays by
mobilizing ideas of justice and fairness. Some interviewees questioned
the value of such hold-ups, which can expose policies to political tur-
moil, put them at risk of being legally challenged and ignore that “we
also have a deadline from a climate perspective”. On the one hand, just
implementation does require time to enable meaningful engagement
of community voices, particularly those who have been historically left
out. As stated by a CAG member: “some of us have not historically been
asked to be involved in these types of groups, so even giving people
time to just mature into those roles requires more time”. On the other
hand, claims of procedural justice can also be strategically misused
by some actors to impede implementation. A city official explained:
“you have some people that are accusing [Boston] of going too slow
because of equity, and other people who, from the equity perspective,
are accusing [Boston] of going too fast”.
Beyond implementation delays, city staff and CAG members
expressed concerns that flexibility measures and funding opportuni-
ties created for under-resourced building owners could be exploited
by large institutions with enough resources to navigate the system and
make their case to the Review Board. A CAG member warned: “some of
the exceptions could swallow the good intentions of the ordinance”.
Regulations also needed to balance the ideals of procedural justice
with the risk of public participation being perversely used to challenge
Review Board decisions, either to advance NIMBY (‘not in my back yard’)
claims or to redress past issues with building owners. A city official
explained: “[BERDO] isn’t your opportunity to right wrongs that you
perceive as being done. Everybody has to be treated in the same way for
consistency […] so that no single decision can be picked apart under
the eyes of the law and overturned”.
Discussion
Our analysis shows that contestations about justice have formed an
inextricable component of the implementation of BERDO. Ideals of
justice, equity and fairness were mobilized by all actors to advance
their interests and influence implementation decisions. These contesta-
tions impacted how BERDO was operationalized on the ground, both in
terms of the process (for example, the engagement of residents in rule-
making) and the resulting implementation decisions (for example, the
adopted regulatory language). This was the case for many regulatory
decisions, including seemingly technocratic topics without explicit
justice mandates. At the same time, policy implementation served as
a site for contesting and reinterpreting the ordinance’s justice goals
and mandates, ultimately redefining what justice means and who is
deserving of justice in the context of BERDO.
The implementation of BERDO illustrates that the politics of
climate justice can transcend the stage of policy planning and be used
as a tool by which to ensure, transform or impede implementation. This
supports previous theories suggesting that climate policy is shaped by
contestations over justice39 and that the ways in which justice is under-
stood in a particular place are critical determinants of how climate
programs come to be developed and implemented2,39,40. Rather than
settling on a single definition of justice, the multiplicity of meanings
of justice under BERDO resulted in regulations that sought to resonate
with multiple, and sometimes conflicting, justice ideals that were
mobilized by different actors. This reveals climate justice not only as
a principle of climate planning or as a policy outcome, as often treated
in the literature14,15, but also as a highly disputed political process in
which competing ideals of justice are contested and translated into
implementation decisions.
Our research highlights important caveats for the implementation
of climate justice. First, whereas visions of climate justice in the city,
such as the “Green New Deal” and “just urban transitions”, necessitate
multi-sectoral and multi-level governance approaches14, implementing
climate justice through a single climate program is inevitably subject to
constraints of scope and scale. In that regard, community-driven imple-
mentation approaches such as the CAG and Review Board must begin
with a shared understanding of the scope and scale of the program at
Justice
contestations
Distribution
Procedure
Recognition
CAG
Regulated parties
City of Boston
The right for building tenants to access the
Review Board and have power in
decision-making processes
Ensuring that flexibility measures do not
prevent environmental justice communities
from receiving the benefits of BERDO
Examples of justice contestations
Recognizing vulnerable building owners
and building tenants
Adding requirements and conditions related to environmental justice:
Certain building portfolios will require “plans to prioritize distribution of
benefits associated with BERDO compliance in buildings in the building
portfolio that are located in environmental justice populations and
afordable housing”
To approve hardship compliance plans, “on a case-by-case basis, the
Review Board may include special conditions relevant to the distribution
of benefits to environmental justice populations and advancing the
purpose of the ordinance”
Creating avenues for tenants to communicate with the Review Board and
participate in decision-making processes:
“The Review Board shall hold one meeting per year dedicated to hear
concerns raised by tenants of residential buildings covered by the
ordinance and provide information directed towards tenants of said
buildings”
“The Review Board shall initiate a proceeding to evaluate a petition from
the greater of twenty percent of tenants or five tenants of a building
included in a building portfolio to terminate the building portfolio”
Creating avenues for vulnerable building owners to access relief
through flexibility mechanisms and for building tenants to
benefit from funding from the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund:
“Low-income owners of building(s) that provide afordable housing
to low-income tenants” are explicitly called out as one of circumstances
and characteristics for accessing hardship compliance plans
“Benefits to afordable housing and tenant protections” are one of the
evaluation criteria that the Review Board shall use to make funding
decisions for the Equitable Emissions Investment Fund
Examples of regulatory language reflecting justice contestations
Fig. 4 | Examples of the impact of justice contestations in rule-making. Examples of how justice contestations are reflected in regulatory language.

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hand. This is not to say that policies should be implemented in a vacuum
or avoid challenging existing power relations and siloing practices
within a city. However, a mismatch between the goals and the reality
of the legal boundaries of implementating climate action can frustrate
the operation of programs and weaken trust between city officials,
advocates and those who they aim to protect.
Second, the implementation of climate justice will inherently
involve a degree of “administrative ordering of nature and society”41.
Implementation requires rendering justice legible through bureau-
cratic tools that, for instance, standardize environmental justice com-
munities into a legal definition or simplify justice into a checklist
of regulatory requirements or a series of benefits to be distributed.
On the one hand, this bureaucratization of justice can result in what
we call “ordinary innovations”—small but meaningful changes that
reimagine policy tools and governing practices to steer cities toward
the social, ethical and political decisions that are needed for just urban
transitions.
On the other hand, however sophisticated, bureaucratic tools are
“projects of legibility”41 that are never fully realized. Intangibles such as
care, compassion and understanding for others cannot be fully codified
in artifacts such as regulations and will need to evolve into everyday
practices and “quiet acts”42 of justice through the mundane decisions
that implementors such as city officials and Review Board members
will take moving forward. As stated by a city official: “as much as it is
codified in the ordinance and supported in regulations, environmental
justice is a practice as well”. This emphasizes how transformative action
takes place not only through grand interventions but also through
mundane and “individually smaller actions” that can collectively shift
systems over time43,44. These everyday practices often occur in “the
middle space” between institutional and community action and, as
with BERDO rule-making, are neither purely top-down nor bottom-up
efforts43.
Finally, the prospective weaponizing of justice highlights the
need for a critical lens in the implementation of justice. Policymakers
should interrogate who is mobilizing justice claims, to what extent and
why, and question when, how and who may misuse or co-opt justice
measures. Well-intentioned environmental laws have been perversely
used to block projects that climate policies seek to promote. That has
been seen with lawsuits under the California Environmental Quality
Act, which have been weaponized to advance economic agendas from
the private sector and put forward NIMBY claims against housing
and greening projects that will serve people of color and diversify
communities45. Under the National Environmental Policy Act, Indig-
enous justice concerns have similarly been co-opted by elite groups
to oppose offshore wind development, thereby perpetuating colonial
relations46. Even community-led initiatives can be “later discovered to
create more problems, more injustices”, with policies often focused
on finding the “path of least resistance” in the near term rather than
environmentally sound and just solutions in the long term47. New
climate justice measures run the same risk of exacerbating environ-
mental and social vulnerabilities if co-opted by actors to advance
their own interests or used in bad faith or in ways that undermine
participatory processes.
Furthermore, our research highlights what is lost when policy
implementation is omitted from studies of climate governance or
when it is over-simplified into combinations of barriers and enabling
factors, without recognition of the inherent political complexities of
the policy process. As cities increasingly integrate justice into climate
action7–9,48, scholars, advocates and practitioners should look at policy
implementation as a key site of political contestation and resistance,
where opposing conceptions of justice are fought out and translated
into action. Future scholarship should examine climate justice
not only as a goal or outcome of policies but also as a set of mundane
practices and “quiet”42 acts of care and resistance that continuously
unfold throughout the implementation of climate action.
Methods
We use a mixed-methods approach that combines participant obser-
vation, semistructured interviews and content analysis to examine
the politics and process of implementing urban climate justice
through BERDO.
Defining urban climate justice
Drawing from existing scholarship, we define urban climate justice
as a concept and social movement that (1) recognizes the inequita-
ble impacts of climate change in cities49,50, (2) acknowledges that
climate change is driven by the historical and structural processes
of environmental racism, settler colonialism, heteropatriarchy and
racial capitalism, all of which structure human–environment inter-
actions51–54, (3) highlights the inequitable impacts of urban climate
action39,55,56 and (4) advances the pursuit of justice through climate
action in cities26,39.
The study of urban climate justice has evolved from and alongside
environmental justice scholarship1,49,57–60. This literature has docu-
mented how communities of color, Indigenous communities and
historically marginalized populations have been disproportionately
exposed to environmental hazards, denied environmental benefits
and excluded from decision-making processes. Environmental justice
scholars have also exposed the connections between environmental
vulnerabilities and structural issues such as environmental racism,
white supremacy, settler colonialism and heteropatriarchy47,49,50,61–64.
Climate justice expands on this scholarship by analysing how these
inequities and structures are also manifested through climate change
and climate policy across geographies and at multiple scales1,49,57.
Although justice has been conceptualized in several distinct ways,
we understand justice to be composed of three dimensions or tenets:
(1) distributive justice, (2) procedural justice and (3) justice as recog-
nition. Distributive justice refers to the fair allocation of the benefits
and burdens of climate change and climate policy39,65. Procedural jus-
tice refers to inclusive participation, engagement, transparency and
accountability in decision-making processes39,63,65,66. Finally, justice as
recognition refers to the respect and valuing of all people in climate
governance and requires the acknowledgement of historic and ongoing
inequities and the pursuit of efforts to reconcile these inequities39,65,67.
Some scholars also add “restorative justice” to highlight the need for
the healing, reconciliation and rebuilding of relationships, communi-
ties and the environment63,68.
One additional conceptual clarification underlies our understand-
ing of urban climate justice. There is no single agreed definition of
“urban” or “the city” in the literature. Different scholars delineate cities
based on population size, population density, political boundaries,
boundaries of mass transit systems, percentages of vegetation and
impervious surface area and the residents’ own perception and expe-
rience of place3,69. Here, we consider urban to be “an area with legally
defined boundaries with recognized urban status and their own local
government”3.
Defining policy implementation
We understand implementation as the process of translating public
policies into operational and enforceable programs70. We primarily
investigate implementation through the process of rule-making.
Through rule-making, city governments develop and issue specific
regulations that establish rules and parameters by which to implement
and enforce a policy71. In this way, rule-making is one of the first and
most critical steps of the policy implementation process. Rule-making
is also a critical site to analyse the operationalization of climate justice
on the ground. Rule-making is where issues of politics and power most
clearly intersect with policy implementation by providing an arena for
city governments and other actors to contest and reinterpret the justice
goals and mandates that were already embedded in climate policies
during the policy planning process72.

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Participant observation
C.V.D. conducted participant observation by working as a Policy
Fellow at the City of Boston’s Environment Department. In this role,
C.V.D. actively participated in the implementation of BERDO, with a
particular emphasis on the rule-making process, which involved work-
ing directly with city staff (1) to engage with community advocates
(the CAG), Boston residents and regulated parties throughout the
regulations process; (2) to prepare materials for public meetings; (3) to
review and analyse public feedback; (4) to draft and revise the regula-
tions language; and (5) to support other implementation activities as
needed. More than 580 h of participant observation were carried out
over a period of 5 months, from June to December 2023. This period
covered most of Phase 3 of the rule-making process (Fig. 1). During
participant observation, detailed notes were taken that focused on
the justice themes that emerged during rule-making, whether and how
different actors articulate, contest and reinterpret justice concerns,
and how the said concerns were translated (or not) into a specific
regulatory or implementation decision. All notes were anonymized
and transcribed into a digital format for analysis. Participant observa-
tion provided us with an in-depth insight into the social, cultural and
political context in which BERDO unfolds, and enabled us to directly
track and experience the process through which the justice goals and
mandates embedded in BERDO were contested, reinterpreted and
ultimately translated into specific regulatory and implementation
decisions. Participant observation also enabled us to add nuance
to the data collected through interviews and content analysis and
facilitated the identification of “subtleties of meaning”73 among city
staff and community advocates.
Interviews
We conducted 20 semistructured interviews with city staff, commu-
nity advocates and leaders involved in the implementation of BERDO.
Interviews are well suited for tracing the chronology of events and
movement of policy ideas74 and for building an understanding of how
“certain events, practices, or knowledges are constructed and enacted
within particular contexts”75, making them effective tools with which to
analyse both the history and politics of policy implementation and situ-
ated views on climate action and justice. We used the semistructured
interview approach to ensure that all interviews covered key topics,
while allowing a conversational approach that enables respondents to
tell their own stories and for new topics to emerge. Whereas the exact
wording and order of questions were tailored to each respondent, all
interviews consisted of a series of open-ended questions that solicited
information about the respondent’s role, influence and perceptions on
the BERDO implementation process. This included the respondents’
perceptions about the justice implications of BERDO, the successes
and challenges of the implementation process, justice concerns that
have been addressed during implementation, justice concerns that
remain unaddressed, and opportunities and challenges for the future
implementation of BERDO. Sample interview scripts can be found in
Supplementary Appendix B.
Respondents were identified through participant observation.
Our final interview sample included ten city staff involved in the rule-
making process and/or other implementation activities for BERDO
and ten community advocates who were part of the CAG during rule-
making. Some respondents had been involved with BERDO since the
policy planning process, whereas others became involved at different
phases of the rule-making process and implementation of BERDO.
Interviews ranged between 30 and 65 min, but most lasted 50 min.
Interviews were conducted in person or over Zoom. All interviews were
audio recorded and transcribed for analysis.
Quotes from interview respondents are identified in the main text
as coming from a “city official”, “city staff” or “CAG member”. The term
“interviewee” is also used sporadically to grant additional anonymity
to the respondents.
Content analysis
We conducted a content analysis of relevant policy documents, records
from public meetings and public comments related to the rule-making
process. We used these data to complement and triangulate our
analysis from participant observation and interviews, and to confirm
the elements of the regulations that were explicitly linked to equity and
justice at different stages of the rule-making process. We gave special
attention to justice controversies related to the implementation of
BERDO and the role and positions of regulated parties, community advo-
cates and other actors in proposing any specific regulations language
or implementation decisions and strategies. This analysis included the
final regulatory language adopted through the rule-making process,
the minutes and materials from 15 public hearings of the Boston Air
Pollution Control Commission, minutes and materials from 12 public
hearings of the Review Board, minutes and materials from 11 CAG meet-
ings, minutes and materials from 12 public meetings held by the City of
Boston’s Environment Department, 134 public comment letters received
as part of the rule-making process, and nine documents that included
city staff responses to public comment letters. A list of public meetings
included in this analysis can be found in Supplementary Appendix C.
Data analysis
We coded all participant observation, interview and content analysis
data using an iterative qualitative process of inductive coding. We first
coded the data according to emergent themes revealed by each source
independently (that is, participant observation notes, interview tran-
scripts and policy documents). We then conducted multiple iterative
rounds of focused coding to homogenize our analysis across all data
sources. The final coding protocol included the following themes:
(1) justice contestations; (2) the implementation process; (3) implemen-
tation decisions and outcomes; and (4) implementation challenges.
The final coding protocol can be found in Supplementary Appendix D.
We used NVivo 20 software for all coding.
Ethics and confidentiality
This research was approved by the Boston University Institutional
Review Board (Exempt Research number 6907X) and complies with all
relevant ethical regulations. City staff and community advocates that
were part of the CAG received a letter explaining the goals and scope of
the research project before the beginning of the participant observa-
tion process. All interview respondents received a letter of informed
consent before participating in an interview. Participants were offered
no compensation. We took all reasonable measures to protect the
confidentiality of participants, which included reporting the findings
from participant observation and interview responses anonymously.
Reporting summary
Further information on research design is available in the Nature
Portfolio Reporting Summary linked to this article.
Data availability
Participant observation, interview transcripts and analysed data are
not publicly available because they contain information that would
compromise the research participants’ confidentiality and undermine
the process of informed consent.
Code availability
No custom algorithms or code were used in the collection or analysis
of the data. All data were analysed using NVivo 20 software.
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to all of the city officials and community leaders
who generously shared their time, knowledge and experiences for
this research. This work was supported by a Boston Area Research
Initiative Seed Grant (C.V.D.), a Fellowship by the Switzer Foundation
(C.V.D.) and the National Science Foundation NSF-2314889 (A.G.S.G.)
and NSF-1735087 (C.V.D.).
Author contributions
C.V.D. and A.G.S.G. conceptualized the work. C.V.D., B.K.S. and A.G.S.G.
carried out the methodology and interpretation of the results. C.V.D.
collected and analysed the data in addition to visualization. The
original draft was written by C.V.D., and B.K.S. and A.G.S.G. reviewed
and edited the paper. Funding acquisition was by C.V.D. and A.G.S.G.
Project supervision was by A.G.S.G. (lead) and B.K.S. (supporting).
Competing interests
C.V.D. continues to be an employee of the City of Boston’s Environment
Department. The co-authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Supplementary information The online version contains supplementary
material available at https://doi.org/10.1038/s44284-024-00121-w.
Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to
Claudia V. Diezmartínez.
Peer review information Nature Cities thanks Juan Palacios,
Tanesha Thomas and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their
contribution to the peer review of this work.
Reprints and permissions information is available at
www.nature.com/reprints.
Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to
jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds
exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with
the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the
accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the
terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature America,
Inc. 2024

    Policy Implications:

Answer:
• Disputes about climate justice took a central role in the implementation of BERDO, which points to lessons and challenges for enacting just actions to address building decarbonization in cities.
• Climate justice requires holistic action, but a single program (such as BERDO) is constrained in its scope and scale. Acknowledging these limits is vital to building trust between city officials and community members.
• Implementation involves standardizing climate justice into concrete measures. This bureaucratization risks reducing justice into box-checking exercises that do not always reflect justice ideals.
• The pursuit of climate justice can be weaponized to stall or impede action. Existing inequities could deepen if justice efforts are coopted to advance the agendas of elites.
• Notions of care, compassion and other intangibles are key for the everyday practice of climate justice. These ideals must be exercised through the mundane decisions that cities will take moving forward.
• Climate justice calls for ‘ordinary innovations’ (for example, incorporating community advisory groups in rulemaking) — small but meaningful changes that reimagine everyday tools and practices in the service of justice.