With over half the world’s population, two-thirds of the world’s energy consumption, and 80% of the world’s GDP, cities not only have direct influence over greenhouse gas emissions, but also face the greatest concentration of physical, social and economic risks associated with climate change.

CDP (formerly Carbon Disclosure Project) is an international, not-for-profit organization providing a global system for companies and cities to measure, disclose, manage and share vital environmental information. This year, 308 cities have reported to CDP, with a focus on the mode of electricity generation – clean versus fossil fuel. Electricity generation is the single largest source of carbon emissions globally, generating 12.6 gigatons of CO₂ (2015).

Analysis of the CDP 2015 data shows that of the participating cities, Latin American cities average 76% of their electricity from clean sources. European cities in the study average 59%. Participating cities in the Asia Pacific region collectively receive 15% of their electricity from non-fossil fuel sources. Overall, cities are making great strides in the shift away from fossil fuels toward the adoption of clean energy: with 35% of cities getting three quarters of their electricity from non-fossil fuel sources.

Cities leading the transition to a lower carbon model include Aspen, Basel, Santa Monica, San Francisco and Stockholm. All of these cities have targets for 100% non-fossil fuel electricity. Ninety-six cities are already taking actions to de-carbonize their energy supply. And these cities understand the business case for doing so: 86% of them say they see economic opportunities from efforts to tackle climate change.

A faster move away from fossil fuel dependency could be accelerated with more private sector support. Many cities cite a need for public finance to help realize their ambitions for low-carbon growth, and more than half of the projects seeking support are located in the developing world, mainly in Latin America and Africa.

The 2015 results from CDP’s cities program are released in an infographic hosted on cdp.net, and city electricity generation mixes can be found here. The disclosures from all cities participating publicly in CDP’s cities program can be found here.

A look back at recent years’ reports:

2014 | 207 cities reported | The report spotlighted cities disclosing that climate change presents a physical risk to their businesses, and that this is serving as a driver for local governments to take action in response.

2013 | 110 cities reported | The report highlighted how climate change action is giving us healthier, wealthier cities. Cities reported annual energy savings of up to US$13 million, and their residents benefitting from healthier living and better business environments.

2012 | 73 cities reported | The report flagged that economic opportunity was a principal motivator for action on climate change.

Ben Smith (ben.smith@archtam.com) is director of sustainable development in ArchTam’s London office and is part of the ArchTam CDP team that has partnered with CDP since 2012, volunteering expertise to provide data analysis, communications and visualization techniques. ArchTam’s full CDP team can be viewed here.

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Cities are rapidly becoming the front line for confronting the implications of climate change. With over half the world’s population, two-thirds of the world’s energy consumption, and 80 percent of the world’s GDP, cities not only have direct influence over greenhouse gas emissions, but also face the greatest concentration of physical, social and economic risks associated with climate change.

A new report examines data from more than 200 cities relating to their concerns about, as well as strategies and activities to address climate change. The report, “Protecting our Capital – how climate adaptation in cities creates a resilient place for business,” is from CDP (formerly Carbon Disclosure Project), ArchTam and the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, and will be released tomorrow, Thursday July 10.

The report launch in New York City will be broadcast live on the web, with a keynote presentation by Vice Admiral Lee Gunn, United States Navy (Ret.), an authority on the social and national security implications of climate change, and the report presentation by Claire Bonham-Carter, director of sustainable development for ArchTam.

To view the live webcast at 6:15 – 7:00 EDT, July 10, (or watch the recording), visit the CDP global cities report launch page.

The 2014 report (and previous reports) will be available on the ArchTam website following the launch.

Erik Miller (erik.miller@archtam.com) is a senior communications manager with ArchTam.

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“In Johannesburg, bus rapid transit (BRT) represents a lot more than it does in most cities. In most cities it is an effective technique for getting residents to and from work faster with fewer carbon emissions during congested rush hours, a technique that was spearheaded in Curitiba, Brazil, and now copied in cities worldwide.

“While decreasing gridlock and improving air quality are welcome co-benefits for most cities, the BRT is fulfilling a much deeper, more powerful, even healing role for Johannesburg.

“A primary driver for Parks Tau, the city’s mayor, for developing the Rea Vaya BRT is to address the legacy of apartheid planning. He calls the BRT lines “corridors of freedom” to emphasise their role in re-stitching separated parts of the city back together, providing a physical means to overcome apartheid era barriers caused by physical space. Transit-orientated development around the Rea Vaya stops are providing new homes, and importantly local day-to-day amenities for communities that once had none and leading to the social integration that is the face of the new Johannesburg.

“This is just one of many incredible stories heard at the C40 Mayor’s Summit that took place in Johannesburg on 5-6 February. The summit brought together mayors, or their deputies, their chiefs of staff, their sustainability directors and environmental aides to the biannual meeting of megacities taking action against climate change. The primary role of the C40 is to facilitate cities to learn from and be inspired by each other on how to reduce their contribution to climate change.”

To read the rest of this post, please go to Building blog. Take a moment to register if you’re not a member: it’s free and easy.

Claire Bonham-Carter (claire.bonham-carter@archtam.com), director of sustainable development, Design + Planning, ArchTam, has led the company’s effort to help deliver the CDP cities global report the past two years. At the summit she delivered individual-city-tailored reports to officials from the cities that participated in the global report, as pictured above.

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Cities may be getting wealthier, but a lot of that wealth is going to be washed away if climate change continues unabated.  How are cities rising to the task of analyzing the co-benefits of protecting their cities from more frequent storms, for example? Is it harder for cities to justify these efforts? What is the biggest driver of adaptation efforts in your recent experience?

Impacts from storms tend to be very visible compared to GHG emissions which are invisible. As storms become more frequent it becomes an easier sell to start to protect against them.  The co-benefits in terms of improvements in public realm or water quality which exist even in the absence of storm is important when choosing what to do.

For example, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is undertaking a massive combined sewer improvement program and developed a triple bottom line assessment tool to help them choose which design alternatives will provide the most benefit from a social, environmental and financial perspective. Those criteria include climate resiliency, improvement in public amenity, biodiversity, improvement in water quality as well as protection of buildings and property.

Drivers for adaptation – no question that impacts of big storms are having an influence. Also an increasing number of cities are seeing high tides overtop their streets right now. This depends on where you are – those places which have been built in areas which are very hot and dry and putting in place plans to ensure they have a water supply in near future.

The conclusion that most research has drawn from this type of data is that city dwellers have a lower carbon footprint. However, isn’t the bigger story that these city dwellers are getting healthier?

Depends on who you are to what is most important – but yes, if you look at a lot of the mitigation and adaptation actions – many of them should also be helping cities become healthier places to live.  Many of the transportation related policies which are aiming to decrease the number of cars on the road, decrease congestion and improve the cleanliness of car emissions will help improve air quality.   Encouraging more people to walk and bike to work, or take transit will keep our population fit and ward off the growing obesity problems in many cities around the world.

Some cities like New York and Baltimore area are implementing programs and policies to effectively transition dirty fuel oil boilers to cleaner natural gas alternatives – which can have a huge impact on air quality.

To what extent does seizing these health co-benefits depend on good quality, long-term master planning? Is your work with cities touching on the master planning process or are those conversations separate?

Many of the health benefits stem from the way a city is configured and whether residents can walk, bicycle, take mass transit or if they are forced to drive.  All modes of transportation require masterplanning interventions within cities – either re configuring streets or ensuring that new development is transit oriented. Many cities are focusing on transit oriented development to help manage growth and congestion. I believe that the growing movement of eco-district’s in cities like Portland, Denver, Seattle, Cleveland, Washington, Singapore is an important idea to raise here – many cities are looking at urban regeneration around the eco-district concept where issues of energy, water and transportation are considered in a very holistic and integrated way. Providing infrastructure at a neighbourhood scale can be much more efficient instead of a building-by-building scale, and can help future proof the developments for changes in technologies in the future.

For a QA with Gary Lawrence, ArchTam’s chief sustainability officer, click here.

Claire Bonham-Carter (claire.bonhamcarter@archtam.com) is director of sustainable development with ArchTam’s Design + Planning practice.

The post What is climate change action doing for cities? appeared first on Blog.

Cities may be getting wealthier, but a lot of that wealth is going to be washed away if climate change continues unabated.  How are cities rising to the task of analyzing the co-benefits of protecting their cities from more frequent storms, for example? Is it harder for cities to justify these efforts? What is the biggest driver of adaptation efforts in your recent experience?

Impacts from storms tend to be very visible compared to GHG emissions which are invisible. As storms become more frequent it becomes an easier sell to start to protect against them.  The co-benefits in terms of improvements in public realm or water quality which exist even in the absence of storm is important when choosing what to do.

For example, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is undertaking a massive combined sewer improvement program and developed a triple bottom line assessment tool to help them choose which design alternatives will provide the most benefit from a social, environmental and financial perspective. Those criteria include climate resiliency, improvement in public amenity, biodiversity, improvement in water quality as well as protection of buildings and property.

Drivers for adaptation – no question that impacts of big storms are having an influence. Also an increasing number of cities are seeing high tides overtop their streets right now. This depends on where you are – those places which have been built in areas which are very hot and dry and putting in place plans to ensure they have a water supply in near future.

The conclusion that most research has drawn from this type of data is that city dwellers have a lower carbon footprint. However, isn’t the bigger story that these city dwellers are getting healthier?

Depends on who you are to what is most important – but yes, if you look at a lot of the mitigation and adaptation actions – many of them should also be helping cities become healthier places to live.  Many of the transportation related policies which are aiming to decrease the number of cars on the road, decrease congestion and improve the cleanliness of car emissions will help improve air quality.   Encouraging more people to walk and bike to work, or take transit will keep our population fit and ward off the growing obesity problems in many cities around the world.

Some cities like New York and Baltimore area are implementing programs and policies to effectively transition dirty fuel oil boilers to cleaner natural gas alternatives – which can have a huge impact on air quality.

To what extent does seizing these health co-benefits depend on good quality, long-term master planning? Is your work with cities touching on the master planning process or are those conversations separate?

Many of the health benefits stem from the way a city is configured and whether residents can walk, bicycle, take mass transit or if they are forced to drive.  All modes of transportation require masterplanning interventions within cities – either re configuring streets or ensuring that new development is transit oriented. Many cities are focusing on transit oriented development to help manage growth and congestion. I believe that the growing movement of eco-district’s in cities like Portland, Denver, Seattle, Cleveland, Washington, Singapore is an important idea to raise here – many cities are looking at urban regeneration around the eco-district concept where issues of energy, water and transportation are considered in a very holistic and integrated way. Providing infrastructure at a neighbourhood scale can be much more efficient instead of a building-by-building scale, and can help future proof the developments for changes in technologies in the future.

For a QA with Gary Lawrence, ArchTam’s chief sustainability officer, click here.

Claire Bonham-Carter (claire.bonhamcarter@archtam.com) is director of sustainable development with ArchTam’s Design + Planning practice.

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