Colorado Land Use Policy & Greenhouse Gas Co-benefits Study

The Colorado Energy Office (CEO), in partnership with the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) and the Department of Local Affairs (DOLA), released the Colorado Land Use Policy & Greenhouse Gas Co-benefits Study. The study assesses the impact of land use policies, analyzing a number of actions — many similar to those the state legislature adopted in 2024 — with the potential to substantially reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with new residential buildings and transportation between now and 2050. 

The study’s results will help inform the projected emissions reduction benefits of the land use strategies included in key state plans, such as the Colorado Greenhouse Gas Pollution Reduction Roadmap update (Roadmap 2.0), as well as from implementing recent land use legislation at the state and local level.

The analysis considered three potential residential growth scenarios for most of the state’s metropolitan regions and several rural resort counties, where the State Demography Office anticipates 98% of Colorado’s population growth will occur by 2050. These models included a baseline scenario that represents local land use regulations in recent “business-as-usual” conditions and two policy scenarios that included packages of new land use policies.

Notably, the study found that policy changes to encourage more compact housing within cities would significantly impact the type and location of new housing in ways that reduce the GHG pollution associated with new development, both from buildings and transportation. The analysis concluded that a robust policy package with a focus on higher density development could reduce building emissions associated with new development by 30% and transportation emissions by nearly 15%.

Colorado Land Use Policy & Greenhouse Gas Co-benefits Study

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