ELLICOTT CITY, MD – Howard County Executive Calvin Ball today announced the release of the County’s Office of Community Sustainability’s (OCS) “HoCo Climate Forward: 2025 Annual Report,” which unveils that to date, Howard County has reduced its community-wide greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 26 percent. Additionally, the report also shows that annual rate of these reductions has increased from 2.7 to 3.7 percent based on new data.
Howard County is now more than a third of the way toward our 2030 goal of a 60 percent reduction in climate-warming emissions. Although we are making great progress towards reducing our community’s carbon footprint, now is the time to double-down on our efforts to reach our 2030 target and become net zero by 2045. Doing so is vital to ensure that Howard County remains a thriving, resilient, sustainable, and prosperous community for all.
From 2005 to 2019, the report shows a 15 percent reduction in GHG gas emission levels in Howard County, a one percent annual reduction rate. However, during the last four years of available GHG data (2019 to 2023), the county nearly quadrupled its annual rate of emissions reduction to 3.7 percent. While this acceleration is a positive indicator towards the county meeting its Climate Forward goal of 60 percent GHG reduction by 2030, the county must accelerate the annual rate of GHG reductions to 4.8 percent.
Since taking office in December 2018, Ball’s team and subsequent Climate Subcabinet have advanced Howard County’s energy efficiency and clean energy deployment, expanded electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure and curbside composting, strengthened watershed protection efforts, dramatically increased tree planting, and built partnerships to ensure that climate action is a community effort.
Climate Action Achievements
The release of this annual report marks the second year of Howard County’s strategic climate action, guided by its “Howard County Climate Forward: Climate Action & Resiliency Plan.” The report provides a snapshot of Howard County Government’s achievements and opportunities in the past year, including:
- Energy – Solar capacity in Howard County increased by 16 megawatts (MW) in Fiscal Year 2025, an increase of 23 percent over the previous year. As of June 30, 2025, the County’s total solar capacity was 150 MW. County staff are working to accelerate solar adoption to reach Climate Forward goals of 437 MW of solar capacity by 2030.
- Nature-Based Climate Solutions –
- As of July 2025, there are more than 144 acres of registered pollinator habitats in Howard County, far surpassing the County’s original 2025 goal of 75 acres.
- The first “green zone” in Maryland, the County’s Savage Park earned this designation by transitioning to electric landscaping equipment, eliminating 570 pounds of toxic emissions annually, among other environmental, health, and safety benefits.
- Howard County supported biodiversity with a pilot project at the East Columbia Campus in which native landscaping was installed under the solar parking canopy to improve pollinator habitat and stormwater benefits.
- Transportation –
- The Regional Transit Agency of Central Maryland achieved a milestone of one million trips in a year, reaching this Climate Forward goal five years early.
- To increase mass transit adoption and availability, the County launched HoCo RapidRide in March 2025. Since then, the service has provided more than 3,000 micro-transit rides to residents living in Elkridge, Jessup, and Savage.
- As of June 2025, more than five percent of cars registered in Howard County were either fully electric or plug-in hybrid, ranking second in the state in community EV adoption. The County continues to implement strategies and initiatives to reach its 2030 Climate Forward EV adoption goal is 26 percent.
- Waste – In March 2025, the County announced the expansion of its “Feed the Green Bin” curbside food scrap collection program to 10,000-plus homes, placing it ahead of pace when it comes to meeting its 100 percent coverage by 2030 goal. Last year alone, this program composted 425 tons of organic waste, avoiding 148 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (the equivalent of planting and growing more than 2,400 trees).
- Emergency Preparedness – Howard County received a $24,000 grant from the Maryland Energy Administration’s Resilient Maryland Program to support resiliency hub planning, including research on solar and battery storage systems, for the County’s Department of Recreation & Parks’ North Laurel and Gary J. Arthur Community Centers.
- Water – In its third year, Howard County’s Community Stormwater Partnership grant program has funded more than 30 water quality improvement projects on nonprofit and homeowner association properties. This program fosters a healthy watershed through projects like rain gardens, conservation landscapes, invasive plant removal, and community education.
- Infrastructure and Heat Resiliency – With funding support from the Chesapeake Bay Trust (CBT), Howard County planted 300 native street trees in targeted areas to provide increased shade and reduce “urban heat island” effects in underserved and heat-vulnerable communities. In 2025, the County will plant an additional 150 native street trees in heat vulnerable areas where older adults congregate, supported by a CBT “Green Streets, Green Towns, Green Jobs” grant.
- Ecosystem Services –
- Howard County partnered with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources to plant 46,800 trees across 107 acres within the County’s Green Infrastructure Network, which will advance progress toward the County’s ambitious goal of attaining 50 percent tree canopy coverage by 2030.
- To protect its existing forest and tree canopy, the Department of Recreation & Parks trained more than 140 volunteers in invasive species management who have helped save more than 1,100 trees through its Tree Savers Program.
Partnerships for Progress
In addition to providing a snapshot of Howard County’s achievements and opportunities, the report also highlights the County’s burgeoning “whole-of-community" effort to mitigate the impacts of climate change, including new government partnerships with local and state institutions. Since October 2024, Howard County has entered into sustainability-focused cooperative agreements with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, the Columbia Association, and its education partners at Howard County Public School System and Howard Community College. This past fiscal year, the County provided $2,611,973 in environmental grants to support green job creation and a host of Climate Forward-aligned initiatives to protect the environment, support resiliency, and mitigate the effects of climate change.
HoCo Climate Forward is a science-based plan to drive local climate action, which now must fill the void left by recent federal policy and funding reversals. By engaging new partners, bolstering existing partners, developing innovative solutions, and systematically tracking our progress during this second year of Climate Forward work, we are rising to the challenge and enlisting the broader community to join the effort.
To learn more about Howard County’s Climate Forward Plan, visit https://climateforward.howardcountymd.gov. From this same site, users will find an online dashboard that offers real-time tracking of progress toward the County’s climate goals. To find out what actions are most impactful to address the climate crisis and access related resources, check out the dashboard’s “What You Can Do” section.