Sustainable city

Summary

The sustainable city, eco-city, or green city is a city designed with consideration for social, economic, environmental impact (commonly referred to as the triple bottom line), and resilient habitat for existing populations, without compromising the ability of future generations to experience the same. The UN Sustainable Development Goal 11 defines sustainable cities as those that are dedicated to achieving green sustainability, social sustainability and economic sustainability. They are committed to doing so by enabling opportunities for all through a design focused on inclusivity as well as maintaining a sustainable economic growth. The focus also includes minimizing required inputs of energy, water, and food, and drastically reducing waste, output of heat, air pollution – , methane, and water pollution. Richard Register, a visual artist, first coined the term ecocity in his 1987 book Ecocity Berkeley: Building Cities for a Healthy Future, where he offers innovative city planning so

Official source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_city

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A new clustering and visualization method to evaluate urban energy planning scenarios

Silvia Coccolo, Dasaraden Mauree, Jean-Louis Scartezzini, Sara Torabi Moghadam

The spatial visualization is a very useful tool to help decision-makers in the urban planning process to create future energy transition strategies, implementing energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies in the context of sustainable cities. Statistical methods are often used to understand the driving parameters of energy consumption but rarely used to evaluate future urban renovation scenarios. Simulating whole cities using energy demand softwares can be very extensive in terms of computer resources and data collection. A new methodology, using city archetypes is proposed, here, to simulate the energy consumption of urban areas including urban energy planning scenarios. The objective of this paper is to present an innovative solution for the computation and visualization of energy saving at the city scale. The energy demand of cities, as well as the micro-climatic conditions, are calculated by using a simplified 3D model designed as function of the city urban geometrical and physical characteristics. Data are extracted from a GIS database that was used in a previous study. In this paper, we showed how the number of buildings to be simulated can be drastically reduced without affecting the accuracy of the results. This model is then used to evaluate the influence of two set of renovation solutions. The energy consumption are then integrated back in the GIS to identify the areas in the city where refurbishment works are needed more rapidly. The city of Settimo Torinese (Italy) is used as a demonstrator for the proposed methodology, which can be applied to all cities worldwide with limited amount of information.

2018

A new clustering and visualization method to evaluate urban heat energy planning scenarios

Silvia Coccolo, Dasaraden Mauree, Jean-Louis Scartezzini, Sara Torabi Moghadam

Spatial visualization is a very useful tool to help decision-makers in the urban planning process, i) to define future energy transition pathways, ii) to implement energy efficiency strategies and iii) to integrate renewable energy technologies in the context of sustainable cities. There is thus a need to develop new tools to understand the energy consumption patterns across cities. Statistical methods are often used to understand the driving parameters of energy consumption but rarely used to evaluate future urban refurbishment scenarios. Simulating whole cities using energy demand softwares can be very extensive in terms of computer resources and data collection. A new methodology, using city archetypes, is hence proposed to simulate the energy consumption of urban areas and to evaluate urban energy planning scenarios. The objective of this paper is to present a solid framework and innovative solution for the computation and visualization of energy saving at the city scale. The energy demand of cities, as well as the microclimatic conditions, are calculated by using a 3D model designed as function of the real city urban geometrical and physical characteristics. Data are extracted from a GIS database. We demonstrate how the number of buildings to be simulated can be drastically reduced thereby significantly decreasing the computational time and without compromising the accuracy of the results. This model is then used to evaluate the influence of two sets of refurbishment solutions. The energy consumption are then integrated back in the GIS to identify the areas in the city where refurbishment works are needed more rapidly. The city of Settimo Torinese (Italy) is used as a demonstrator for the proposed methodology, which can be applied to medium-sized cities worldwide with limited amount of information.

2019

While the smart city model is seen as a means to cope with challenges cities are facing, it is often reduced to an amalgam of technologies. Citizens are seldom included in the planning process, although they hold a key position to produce and share valuable knowledge on how they use and live in the city. Digital tools offer new opportunities to improve interaction and information exchange among urban planners and citizens, which can lead to more sustainable and responsive planning. This research intends to answer the following questions: ‘what are the opportunities and limits of involving citizens in the urban planning and decision making through digital tools?’, ‘what are the barriers to harness these tools and include citizens in the planning process?’, and ‘what are the levers to change current practices?’, The aims of this research are to understand how digital technologies open new means of planning more responsive and sustainable cities and how the role of citizens, as well as the one of urban planners, are changing in this context. To explore this topic, this research follows two different approaches. The first investigation produces a catalogue of worldwide existing digital tools for participatory urban planning. These practices are analysed regarding data (collection, production, and analysis), interactions, degree of involvement of the participant, outcomes of the tool and use of the produced information in the planning process. By giving an overview of the multiplicity of tools, this approach allows to determine both the opportunities – particularly in terms of data production and exchange – and the limitations of digital tools for participation. This overview gives a new insight on the potential use of digital tools. The second approach is a detailed study of planning processes in two cities, Geneva and Singapore, to compare their practices. Interviews with practitioners and analysis of planning documents, tools and policies are the methods used to describe current procedures in these two cities. These case studies have been selected for two reasons. Firstly, it compares a technology-driven city with one that has not yet taken full advantage of technologically driven planning practices. Secondly, it allows a comparison of top-down strategies that are supported with bottom-up initiatives with citizen-centric planning strategies. This approach helps us understand the interactions among stakeholders, the limitations of the ongoing procedures, and the barriers that hinder change. Urban planning procedures vary from one city to another, but good practices and levers for change can be identified, and put forward as recommendations to improve urban planning practices. However, many challenges need to be overcome in order to achieve this. The main challenge of studying innovative digital practices is that the value of the tools is often exaggerated. The promoted benefits are not often used to their full potential. Moreover, it is difficult to identify the deficiencies of existing practices, as practitioners will hardly ever point out failings in their own methods or practices. Another shortcoming is that procedures, tools and technology are evolving at a fast pace, which requires regular updates of data.

2017

A new clustering and visualization method to evaluate urban heat energy planning scenarios

Silvia Coccolo, Dasaraden Mauree, Jean-Louis Scartezzini, Sara Torabi Moghadam

2019