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\"This book explores opportunities and challenges urban communities face, as they seek to become sustainable systems embedded in their diverse and complex social and environmental contexts\"-- Provided by publisher.

Southern African cities face several challenges including management of rapid urbanization, rising populations, expanding informal settlements; adequate water and other service provision, and a host of governance challenges. Climate change and variability add a compounding effect to this complex, multi stressor context. Addressing the complexity requires an understanding of urban ecosystems functioning and interactions amongst the built and natural environment (climate) and human systems. In this paper we argue that learning is essential for cities to be resilient to current and future challenges. We profile the Future Resilience for African CiTies And Lands (FRACTAL) project which contributed towards climate resilient development by providing relevant climate information for decision-making at the city regional scale in southern Africa. Following FRACTAL's city-to-city learning approach of sharing good practices, knowledge and experiences framed around transdisciplinary research, the study cities of Harare, Lusaka, Windhoek and Durban conducted city learning exchange visits between 2017 and 2018. We used a mixed methods approach to collect and analyze historical climate and hydrological data and current socio-economic and development data among the cities. A qualitative, in-depth, case study comparative analysis was used to identify similarities and differences as well as lessons drawn from the learning process during the city exchanges and these were complimented by desktop studies. Results showed water scarcity, large informal settlements, reliance on external water and energy sources, inadequate protection of ecologically sensitive resources and service provision as some of the common complications in the cities. Several lessons and transferable practices learnt from the cities included effective water conservation and waste management and the use of public-private partnerships in Windhoek, community engagements in Durban and Lusaka while lessons on decisive leadership in dealing with informal settlements emanated from Harare's limited informal settlements. Lastly, Durban's Adaptation Charter and integrated climate planning provided lessons for biodiversity protection and mainstreaming climate change at city governance level. While we recognize that cities are context-specific we consider these good practices as being broadly transferable to other southern African cities. We conclude that social, experiential and structured learning can be an innovative way of multi-stakeholder engagement and a useful approach to increase city resilience planning across southern Africa and cities that face similar developmental challenges.

The global energy demand has greatly impacted greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. Since buildings are responsible for a large portion of global energy consumption, this study investigates the energy-saving potential of green roofs and cool roofs in reducing building energy consumption. Using an integrated approach that combines climate change modeling and building energy simulation, the study evaluates these strategies in six global cities (Cairo, Hong Kong, Seoul, London, Los Angeles, and Sao Paulo) under current and future climate change scenarios. The results show that in future climates, the implementation of green and cool roofs at the city level can lead to substantial annual energy reductions, with up to 65.51% and 71.72% reduction in HVAC consumption, respectively, by 2100. These findings can guide the implementation of these strategies in different climatic zones worldwide, informing the selection and design of suitable roof mitigation strategies for specific urban contexts.

A new way is proposed to thermodynamically gauge the evolving complexity of nation-states and their growing cities. Energy rate density is a useful metric to track the evolution of energy budgets, which help facilitate how well or badly human society trends toward winning or losing. The fates of nations and their cities are unknown, their success is not assured. Those nations and cities with rising per-capita energy usage while developing and those that are nearly flat while already developed seem destined to endure; those with falling energy usage seem likely to fail. Globally, more energy, not less, and more energy rate density, too, will be needed in the 21st century. Conserving energy and efficiently using it are welcome since energy costs less when used less, but neither will likely help much to mitigate increasing energy demands. To survive, humanity nationally and internationally needs to culturally adapt to using more, clean, safe energy by embracing the Sun in an evolving Universe, where nations and their cities resemble galaxies and their stars as well as Earth and its life.

The aim of this study is to explore how marine ranching construction enhances the market-oriented potential for energy conservation and emission reduction in China’s coastal cities, and its motivation is to assess the role of marine ranching in promoting sustainable development and environmental protection in these urban areas. With a sample of 53 coastal cities, including experimental-group cities designated as national marine-ranching demonstration zones and a control group of other coastal cities, this research employs theoretical pathway analysis and a quasi-natural experiment design. The findings reveal that marine ranching notably improves both the green innovation capability and industrial upgrading in coastal cities, ultimately stimulating their market-oriented emission-reduction potential. Importantly, extreme weather conditions are found to disrupt the positive impact of marine ranching on the emission-reduction potential in coastal cities, while financial stability ensures its sustained beneficial effects. This study underscores the crucial role of marine ranching in promoting sustainable development and emission reduction in China’s coastal urban areas, emphasizing the importance of addressing climate challenges and maintaining financial stability.

Noise is considered as one of the challenging problems in big cities. However, this noise could be utilized in producing energy especially in dense urban areas. Sound as a form of mechanical energy, it can be converted to electric energy through many approaches including heating, by using the diaphragm and through using piezoelectric materials. This research aims at utilizing noise through using piezoelectric materials as an approach of conversion to produce green sustainable electric energy that can be used to decrease the energy consumption from non-renewable sources and utilizing this energy in street lighting. The study was carried in three bus stations in Alexandria by having measurements during weekdays and weekends in order to study the noise produced in the selected stations and the amount of electric energy that could be produced and utilized in street lighting. The noise level index LDEN was calculated for each of the three selected locations. The equivalent noise level values were always exceeding the limits through the day, evening and night. At daytime they ranged between 75-85 dB which is higher that the permissible limit by 10-20 dB, at evening they ranged from 80-85 dB which is also higher than the permissible limit with 20-25 dB and at the night they ranged from 75-80 dB which is higher by 20-25 dB than the permissible limit. The research concluded that utilizing noise using the piezoelectric material is successful. The electric energy produced from an area of 1.45 m2 containing 690 piezoelectric QB220-503YB transducers at each of the selected stations was about 0.024 watt hr. This amount of electric energy is too small to be used in an application. So the application area should be maximized to hundreds of square meters to produce beneficial electric energy that can be used in lighting 1 LED street lamp or it can be stored and used when needed in applications that use greater amount of electric energy and this would help in reducing the energy consumed.

Urban trees provide many ecosystem services, including carbon sequestration, air quality improvement, storm water attenuation and energy conservation, to people living in cities. Provisioning of ecosystem services by urban trees, however, may be jeopardized by the typically poor quality of the soils in urban areas. Given their well-known multifunctional role in forest ecosystems, ectomycorrhizal fungi (EcM) may also contribute to urban tree health and thus ecosystem service provisioning. Yet, no studies so far have directly related in situ EcM community composition to urban tree health indicators. Here, two previously collected datasets were combined: i) tree health data of 175 Tilia tomentosa trees from three European cities (Leuven, Strasbourg and Porto) estimated using a range of reflectance, chlorophyll fluorescence and physical leaf indicators, and ii) ectomycorrhizal diversity of these trees as characterized by next-generation sequencing. Tree health indicators were related to soil characteristics and EcM diversity using canonical redundancy analysis. Soil organic matter significantly explained variation in tree health indicators whereas no significant relation between mycorrhizal diversity variables and the tree health indicators was found. We conclude that mainly soil organic matter, through promoting soil aggregate formation and porosity, and thus indirectly tree water availability, positively affects the health of trees in urban areas. Our results suggest that urban planners should not overlook the importance of soil quality and its water holding capacity for the health of urban trees and potentially also for the ecosystem services they deliver. Further research should also study other soil microbiota which may independently, or in interaction with ectomycorrhiza, mediate tree performance in urban settings.

This study investigates the application and transformation potential of smart city concepts along Zhongyang Road in Hsinchu City, Taiwan. By introducing evaluation mechanisms such as the Smart City Maturity Index (SCMI) and the Composite Key Performance Indicator (CKPI), the research systematically analyzes the effectiveness of implementations across areas including transportation, energy, governance, and citizen engagement. Furthermore, Formula (1) is applied to assess the improvement in average delay time after the integration of smart technologies, while Formula (2) quantifies the annual energy savings achieved by replacing conventional streetlights with solar-powered ones, demonstrating tangible energy-saving and carbon-reduction benefits. The findings indicate that cross-sector collaboration and technological integration can significantly enhance urban operational efficiency and sustainability, providing valuable insights for the development of other new towns.

Urban systems now house about half of the world's population, but determine some three quarters of the global economy and its associated energy use and resulting environmental impacts. The twenty-first century will be increasingly urban. Sustainable development therefore needs first to be defined and analyzed, and then realized in urban settings. Energy is one of the key challenges, but also one of the key opportunities in the required urban sustainability transition. The book is the result of a major international effort to conduct the first comprehensive assessment of energy-related urban sustainability issues conducted under the auspices of the Global Energy Assessment (GEA). The assessment is also unique in that it embeds energy issues into the broader sustainability agenda of cities: including housing for the poor, functional transport systems, as well as environmental quality, in addition to the challenges imposed by climate change. Written by an eminent team of internationally renowned scholars it presents new data, new analysis, as well as new policy insights. It includes the first comprehensive global coverage overview of urban energy use and of the specifics of urban energy demand and supply. Major development and sustainability challenges of cities are assessed in detail and public and private sector opportunities and constraints of a sustainability transition examined in detail. Technological and policy options are put in a much needed context in terms of their respective role as drivers of urban energy demand as well as potentials for reductions in energy use and associated emissions of local pollutants as well as greenhouse gases. The analysis presents both a comprehensive literature review as well as novel, spatially explicit models of integrated urban energy policy analysis. The volume concludes with a summary assessment of policy options, priorities as well as paradoxes.

As global demand for energy grows and prices rise, a city's energy consumption becomes increasingly tied to its economic viability, warns the author of The Very Hungry City. Austin Troy, a seasoned expert in urban environmental management, explains for general readers how a city with a high \"urban energy metabolism\"--that is, a city that needs large amounts of energy in order to function--will be at a competitive disadvantage in the future. He explores why cities have different energy metabolisms and discusses an array of innovative approaches to the problems of expensive energy consumption. Troy looks at dozens of cities and suburbs in Europe and the United States--from Los Angeles to Copenhagen, Denver to the Swedish urban redevelopment project Hammarby Sjöstad--to understand the diverse factors that affect their energy use: behavior, climate, water supply, building quality, transportation, and others. He then assesses some of the most imaginative solutions that cities have proposed, among them green building, energy-efficient neighborhoods, symbiotic infrastructure, congestion pricing, transit-oriented development, and water conservation. To conclude, the author addresses planning and policy approaches that can bring about change and transform the best ideas into real solutions. This book explores how cities around the world consume energy, assesses innovative ideas for reducing urban energy consumption, and discusses why energy efficiency will determine which cities thrive economically in the future.