PALO ALTO — Palo Alto will be part of a three-city experiment to get residents to work block by block on sustainability and climate change goals in their daily lives.

Climate change often is discussed broadly, but the Cool Block pilot program takes a “bottom-up” approach, said Sandra Slater, the Northern California director of the Cool City Challenge, an initiative of the Empowerment Institute.

The program’s goal is to get households to take action on climate change, be more socially connected with each other and work on growing the green economy.

Residents can work on goals big and small, choosing from 112 “action recipes” that range from changing the thermostat on hot water heaters to eating less meat.

Depending on residents’ interest, Cool Block organizers will direct residents to available city programs, such as Zero Waste for energy efficiency or the Emergency Service Volunteers program for emergency preparedness.

“It’s up to us and the choices we make every single day,” Slater said.

In the next month, Slater will recruit 10 residents interested in being block leaders. She’s hoping the volunteers will be representative of the city’s geography and be a good mix of homeowners and renters.

Slater and the block leaders will then seek participants on the streets where the block leaders live.

Participants from the 10 blocks will have nine small-group meetings in 4 ½ months time. Another 20 blocks will participate between October and February 2017.

The City Council voted Monday to participate in Cool Block.

For more information, contact Slater at sandra@sandraslater.com or visit www.coolcitychallenge.org.

Email Jacqueline Lee at jlee1@dailynewsgroup.com or call her at 650-391-1334; follow her at twitter.com/jleenews.