Remarkable Cities And The Fight Against Climate Change

Our cities and communities face an uncertain and daunting future. Diverse challenges, including an increasingly warmer and erratic climate, losses of biodiversity, disparities in economic equality, and state and federal hostility to local action, test the survival of many communities. Paralleling these challenges is an explosion of development that will rival post-World War II land use expansion. Yet most development codes are decades old and not prepared to confront today's changes, and many local governments do not have the time or resources to research and address the myriad of changes and uncertainty they face. The Sustainability Development Code (SDC) project provides concrete ways for communities to amend development codes and adapt to new challenges as they occur. The SDC aims to help all local governments, regardless of size and budget, build more resilient, environmentally conscious, economically secure and socially equitable communities. In tandem with the SDC project, this book arms local governments with a diversity of approaches to meet the climate change challenge, focusing on actions that are traditionally within local governments' land use and development authority.

Climate change is one of the most significant global challenges facing the world today. It is also a critical issue for the world’s cities. Now home to over half the world’s population, urban areas are significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions and are vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Responding to climate change is a profound challenge. A variety of actors are involved in urban climate governance, with municipal governments, international organisations, and funding bodies pointing to cities as key arenas for response. This book provides the first critical introduction to these challenges, giving an overview of the science and policy of climate change at the global level and the emergence of climate change as an urban policy issue. It considers the challenges of governing climate change in the city in the context of the changing nature of urban politics, economics, society and infrastructures. It looks at how responses for mitigation and adaptation have emerged within the city, and the implications of climate change for social and environmental justice. Drawing on examples from cities in the north and south, and richly illustrated with detailed case-studies, this book will enable students to understand the potential and limits of addressing climate change at the urban level and to explore the consequences for our future cities. It will be essential reading for undergraduate students across the disciplines of geography, politics, sociology, urban studies, planning and science and technology studies.

This timely and incisive book combines an introduction to the core legal and policy issues presented by climate change with a deeper analysis of decisions that will define the path forward. Offering a guide to key terms, concepts, and legal principles in the field, this book will help readers develop a sophisticated perspective on issues central to climate change law and policy.

Cities are one of the most significant contributors to global climate change. The rapid speed at which urban centers use large amounts of resources adds to the global crisis and can lead to extreme local heat. The Urban Fix addresses how urban design, planning and policies can counter the threats of climate change, urban heat islands and overpopulation, helping cities take full advantage of their inherent advantages and new technologies to catalyze social, cultural and physical solutions to combat the epic, unprecedented challenges humanity faces. The book fills a conspicuous void in the international dialogue on climate change and heat islands by examining both the environmental benefits in developed countries and the population benefit in developing countries. Urban heat islands can be addressed in incremental, manageable steps, such as planting trees and painting roofs white, which provide a more concrete and proactive sense of progress for policymakers and practitioners. This book is invaluable to anyone searching for a better understanding of the impact of resilient cities in the monumental and urgent fight against climate change, and provides the tools to do so.

Climate change is one of the most challenging issues of our time. As key sites in the production and management of emissions of greenhouse gases, cities will be crucial for the implementation of international agreements and national policies on climate change. This book provides a critical analysis of the role of cities in addressing climate change and the prospects for urban sustainability. Cities and Climate Change is the first in-depth analysis of the role of cities in addressing climate change. The book argues that key challenges concerning the resources and powers of local government, as well as conflicts between local goals for economic development and climate change mitigation, have restricted the level of local action on climate change. These findings have significant implications for the prospects of mitigating climate change and achieving urban sustainability. This book provides a valuable interdisciplinary analysis of these issues, and will appeal to students and researchers interested in sustainability at local and global scales.

This thoroughly revised Research Handbook on Climate Change Adaptation Law brings together leading scholars in the field to summarise and assess key topics including tort and insurance law, disaster law, water law and marine law as well as biodiversity law and pollution control.

A pointed argument that cities—not nation-states—can and must take the lead in fighting climate change Climate change is the most urgent challenge we face in an interdependent world where independent nations have grown increasingly unable to cooperate effectively on sustainability. In this book, renowned political theorist Benjamin R. Barber describes how cities, by assuming important aspects of sovereignty, can take the lead from faltering nation states in fighting climate change. Barber argues that with more than half the world's population now in urban areas, where 80 percent of both GDP and greenhouse gas emissions are generated, cities are the key to the future of democracy and sustainability. In this compelling sequel to If Mayors Ruled the World, Barber assesses both broad principles of urban rights and specific strategies of sustainability such as fracking bans, walkable cities, above-ground mining of precious resources, energy and heating drawn from garbage incineration, downtown wind turbines, and skyscrapers built from wood. He shows how cities working together on climate change, despite their differences in wealth, development, and culture, can find common measures by which to evaluate the radically different policies they pursue. This is a book for a world in which bold cities are collaborating to combat climate change and inspire hope for democracy even as reactionary populists take over national governments in the United States and Europe. It calls for a new social contract among citizens and municipalities to secure not only their sustainability but their survival.

Cities have taken a leading role in efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. As federal and state climate policy waxes and wanes, many of the largest U.S. cities have pledged themselves to ambitious sustainability goals, as have smaller communities across the country. City-level policy makers, facing a range of political constraints, a thicket of federal and state laws, and varying degrees of municipal authority, need to figure out how to meet their climate commitments. Urban Climate Law is a practical, user-friendly primer on the legal challenges and opportunities for effective and equitable decarbonization. Michael Burger and Amy E. Turner—leading experts in local climate law and policy—examine the key issues surrounding climate mitigation policies across the buildings, transportation, waste, and energy sectors, with an emphasis on environmental justice. They explore the legal frameworks and factors that can constrain or enable various approaches at the municipal level. Burger and Turner clearly and accessibly present complex legal topics like preemption, federal statutes such as the Clean Air Act, and constitutional law for readers without legal backgrounds, including students, advocates, officials, and other practitioners. Aimed at a nonspecialist audience, this book provides concise and comprehensible answers to the core questions cities confront when seeking to develop legally sound local climate policy.