Sustainable Urban Metabolism

Sustainable Urban Metabolism PDF Author: Paulo Ferrao
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262019361
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
A unified framework for analyzing urban sustainability in terms of cities' inflows and outflows of matter and energy. Urbanization and globalization have shaped the last hundred years. These two dominant trends are mutually reinforcing: globalization links countries through the networked communications of urban hubs. The urban population now generates more than eighty percent of global GDP. Cities account for enormous flows of energy and materials—inflows of goods and services and outflows of waste. Thus urban environmental management critically affects global sustainability. In this book, Paulo Ferrão and John Fernández offer a metabolic perspective on urban sustainability, viewing the city as a metabolism, in terms of its exchanges of matter and energy. Their book provides a roadmap to the strategies and tools needed for a scientifically based framework for analyzing and promoting the sustainability of urban systems. Using the concept of urban metabolism as a unifying framework, Ferrão and Fernandez describe a systems-oriented approach that establishes useful linkages among environmental, economic, social, and technical infrastructure issues. These linkages lead to an integrated information-intensive platform that enables ecologically informed urban planning. After establishing the theoretical background and describing the diversity of contributing disciplines, the authors sample sustainability approaches and tools, offer an extended study of the urban metabolism of Lisbon, and outline the challenges and opportunities in approaching urban sustainability in both developed and developing countries.

Sustainable Urban Metabolism

Sustainable Urban Metabolism PDF Author: Paulo Ferrao
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262019361
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
A unified framework for analyzing urban sustainability in terms of cities' inflows and outflows of matter and energy. Urbanization and globalization have shaped the last hundred years. These two dominant trends are mutually reinforcing: globalization links countries through the networked communications of urban hubs. The urban population now generates more than eighty percent of global GDP. Cities account for enormous flows of energy and materials—inflows of goods and services and outflows of waste. Thus urban environmental management critically affects global sustainability. In this book, Paulo Ferrão and John Fernández offer a metabolic perspective on urban sustainability, viewing the city as a metabolism, in terms of its exchanges of matter and energy. Their book provides a roadmap to the strategies and tools needed for a scientifically based framework for analyzing and promoting the sustainability of urban systems. Using the concept of urban metabolism as a unifying framework, Ferrão and Fernandez describe a systems-oriented approach that establishes useful linkages among environmental, economic, social, and technical infrastructure issues. These linkages lead to an integrated information-intensive platform that enables ecologically informed urban planning. After establishing the theoretical background and describing the diversity of contributing disciplines, the authors sample sustainability approaches and tools, offer an extended study of the urban metabolism of Lisbon, and outline the challenges and opportunities in approaching urban sustainability in both developed and developing countries.

New Urban Metabolism

New Urban Metabolism PDF Author: Josep Antoni Acebillo
Publisher: ACTAR Publishers
ISBN: 8492861479
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 270

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Book Description
"The iCUP (Institute for Contemporary Urban Project) is the institute, directed by ... Acebillo and coordinated by ... Enrico Sassi, within which this book has been produced and it is part of the Accademia di architettura, USI (Universita della Svizzera Italiana), Mendrisio"--Page 6.

Understanding Urban Metabolism

Understanding Urban Metabolism PDF Author: Nektarios Chrysoulakis
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317658663
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
Understanding Urban Metabolism addresses the gap between the bio-physical sciences and urban planning and illustrates the advantages of accounting for urban metabolism issues in urban design decisions. Urban metabolism considers a city as a system, and distinguishes between energy and material flows as its components. Based on research from the BRIDGE project, this book deals with how the urban surface exchanges and transforms energy, water, carbon and pollutants in cities. This book also introduces a new method for evaluating how planning alternatives can modify the physical flows of urban metabolism components and how environmental and socioeconomic components interact. The inclusion of sustainability principles into urban planning provides an opportunity to place the new knowledge provided by bio-physical sciences at the centre of the planning process, but there is a strong need to bridge knowledge and practice, as well as for a better dissemination of research results and exchange of best practice. This book meets that need and provides the reader with the necessary tools to integrate an understanding of urban metabolism into urban planning practice.

Urban Informatics

Urban Informatics PDF Author: Wenzhong Shi
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 9811589836
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 941

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Book Description
This open access book is the first to systematically introduce the principles of urban informatics and its application to every aspect of the city that involves its functioning, control, management, and future planning. It introduces new models and tools being developed to understand and implement these technologies that enable cities to function more efficiently – to become ‘smart’ and ‘sustainable’. The smart city has quickly emerged as computers have become ever smaller to the point where they can be embedded into the very fabric of the city, as well as being central to new ways in which the population can communicate and act. When cities are wired in this way, they have the potential to become sentient and responsive, generating massive streams of ‘big’ data in real time as well as providing immense opportunities for extracting new forms of urban data through crowdsourcing. This book offers a comprehensive review of the methods that form the core of urban informatics from various kinds of urban remote sensing to new approaches to machine learning and statistical modelling. It provides a detailed technical introduction to the wide array of tools information scientists need to develop the key urban analytics that are fundamental to learning about the smart city, and it outlines ways in which these tools can be used to inform design and policy so that cities can become more efficient with a greater concern for environment and equity.

Urban Metabolism

Urban Metabolism PDF Author: Yan Zhang
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 9811991235
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 474

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Book Description
This book provides the basic theory, method framework and application results of urban metabolism. Urban metabolism is an important research philosophy and approach for analyzing urban mega organism and its ecological environmental problems. It has constantly formed quantitative network research framework and analysis methods in a metaphor way and expanded its application in different scales such as global, national, urban agglomeration and city to support the process of multi-scale regional sustainable development.

Urban Metabolism and Climate Change

Urban Metabolism and Climate Change PDF Author: Rahul Bhadouria
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 303129422X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 362

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Book Description
This book provides a basic understanding and state-of-the-art of urban metabolism. Urban centres are increasingly challenged by population increase and the resultant environmental concerns including the urban sprawl and climate change. Different patterns of urbanization contribute to the changing climate via. differences in their urban metabolism represented by energy and matter. Urban metabolic studies in terms of energy and material inflows, outflows, and stocks can be associated with traditional evaluation techniques to help assess the magnitude and potential effects of variety of environmental challenges the world is facing today. Urban centres are critical real time observatories that indicate the impact anthropogenic activities have on global biogeochemical cycles. Urban processes have significant and lasting impacts on the global carbon budget. The technological and infrastructural advancements have fuelled an increase in urban inputs and outputs of material and energy. Therefore, more sustainable approaches need to be adopted in changing scenarios for urban planning, particularly for sustainable resource utilization and better waste management practices. The book emphasises on the sustainability in urban metabolism, sustainable urban planning, ecosystem services, and disaster resilience to provide an interdisciplinary understanding of urban metabolism. The book also identifies an urgent need to develop new methodological approaches for real time and reliable evaluation of urban metabolism.

Urban Metabolism of Six Asian Cities

Urban Metabolism of Six Asian Cities PDF Author: Asian Development Bank
Publisher: Asian Development Bank
ISBN: 9292546600
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 165

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Book Description
The urban metabolism framework maps the activities of cities from their consumption of materials, the different activities associated with those processes, and the wastes produced. Information generated provides a diagnostic tool for identifying high waste generating or inefficient activities and identifying potential points of policy intervention. The streamlined approach surmounts the lack of city level data, which is often cited as the most significant limitation preventing material flow analysis at the city level. Extension of the methodology to cover more cities can contribute toward creating benchmarks for city typologies.

Urban Metabolism and Ecological Management:

Urban Metabolism and Ecological Management: PDF Author: Gengyuan LIU
Publisher: EDP Sciences
ISBN: 2759825205
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 826

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Book Description
Urbanization is the one of the most evident forms of anthropization. With most of the world population living in cities, the need of thinking about a more sustainable urban lifestyle has become an imperative. This is why present and future generations of scholars, urban managers and policy makers should be prepared to work together to support the reduction of impacts generated by urban activities, while pursuing the goal of an equitable and sustainable well-being within the planetary boundaries. In this respect, the use of different methods and tools can support the implementation of roadmaps and policies. Besides that, different communication languages can be used to enhance the development of a shared reflective vision about the future of cities among citizens, as major actors of the urban life and its transformation. This book provides an accessible overview of some key methods to deal holistically with the analysis of urban resources flows to readers with an interest in the academic or professional reference of the different approaches for studying urban metabolism. It presents some of the most important tools along with relevant case studies to illustrate their potential application. Experts in the field and holding the belief that visions and hopes trigger decisions and behaviors beyond the knowledge, the authors introduce readers to the use of different art-based methods to engage with citizens towards a common outlook on the future of our cities. The book also offers an enhanced reading experience by featuring a soundtrack composed by one of the authors and available through the QR code at the beginning of each chapter.

Urban Planet

Urban Planet PDF Author: Thomas Elmqvist
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108186963
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
Global urbanization promises better services, stronger economies, and more connections; it also carries risks and unforeseeable consequences. To deepen our understanding of this complex process and its importance for global sustainability, we need to build interdisciplinary knowledge around a systems approach. Urban Planet takes an integrative look at our urban environment, bringing together scholars from a diverse range of disciplines: from sociology and political science to evolutionary biology, geography, economics and engineering. It includes the perspectives of often neglected voices: architects, journalists, artists and activists. The book provides a much needed cross-scale perspective, connecting challenges and solutions on a local scale with drivers and policy frameworks on a regional and global scale. The authors argue that to overcome the major challenges we are facing, we must embark on a large-scale reinvention of how we live together, grounded in inclusiveness and sustainability. This title is also available Open Access.

The Case for Degrowth

The Case for Degrowth PDF Author: Susan Paulson
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1509535640
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 74

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Book Description
The relentless pursuit of economic growth is the defining characteristic of contemporary societies. Yet it benefits few and demands monstrous social and ecological sacrifice. Is there a viable alternative? How can we halt the endless quest to grow global production and consumption and instead secure socio-ecological conditions that support lives worth living for all? In this compelling book, leading experts Giorgos Kallis, Susan Paulson, Giacomo D’Alisa and Federico Demaria make the case for degrowth - living well with less, by living differently, prioritizing wellbeing, equity and sustainability. Drawing on emerging initiatives and enduring traditions around the world, they advance a radical degrowth vision and outline policies to shape work and care, income and investment that avoid exploitative and unsustainable practices. Degrowth, they argue, can be achieved through transformative strategies that allow societies to slow down by design, not disaster. Essential reading for all concerned citizens, policy-makers, and students, this book will be an important contribution to one of the thorniest and most pressing debates of our era.