Future Cities: Dynamics and Sustainability (ALLIANCE FOR GLOBAL SUSTAINABILITY SERIES Volume 1) (Alliance for Global Sustainability Series, 1)

From the reviews: "Future Cities: Dynamics and Sustainability, is an edited volume that consists of theoretical and analytical articles. ... The editors are optimistic that despite all the impacts cities are making on natural processes, cities are not necessarily in conflict with the environment. ... the book presents articles with a highly academic focus that should prove useful to students and researchers who are interested in urban metabolism and its sustainability linkages." (Xuemei Bai, Journal of Industrial Ecology, Vol. 7 (2), 2003)

The world's burgeoning cities are a critical fact of the 21st Century - and represent one of the greatest challenges to the future. By the year 2050 cities with populations over three million will more than double from 70 today to over 150.

The authors in this book claim that contrary to conventional wisdom, that cities distort natural processes, just the opposite is true. Cities are far more than the sinks of energy, vast drains of natural resources, and obstacles to sustainable development. Properly managed, they claim, cities can be transformative arenas in which raw materials may be rationally and economically developed to support people decently, and whole regions sustainably.

This volume provides new ideas for managing the mega-cities of our future. The editors' goal is to shape a new way of thinking about mega-cities - one that promotes their function in modern societies as engines of the ideas, technologies, and loci of political will needed to build a new regime of global sustainability.

The world's burgeoning cities are a critical fact of the 21st Century - and represent one of the greatest challenges to the future. By the year 2050 cities with populations over three million will more than double from 70 today to over 150. The authors in this book claim that contrary to conventional wisdom, that cities distort natural processes, just the opposite is true. Cities are far more than the sinks of energy, vast drains of natural resources, and obstacles to sustainable development. Properly managed, they claim, cities can be transformative arenas in which raw materials may be rationally and economically developed to support people decently, and whole regions sustainably. This volume provides new ideas for managing the mega-cities of our future. The editors' goal is to shape a new way of thinking about mega-cities - one that promotes their function in modern societies as engines of the ideas, technologies, and loci of political will needed to build a new regime of global sustainability Front Matter....Pages i-viii Introduction....Pages 1-15 Restructuring Urban Systems....Pages 17-43 Scenarios for the Transition to a Second Solar Society: Case Study of a Swiss Lowland Region....Pages 45-64 Sustainable Water Management....Pages 65-85 Brook Revitalization in Zürich: A Multisystems Analysis of Sustainable Development....Pages 87-104 Environmental Loading of Resource and Heat Recovery....Pages 105-130 Towards Sustainable Urban Transport: Finding Synergies between Lowering Local and Global Impacts....Pages 131-147 The Urban Heat Environment and Urban Sustainability....Pages 149-172 “Green” Buildings: Private and Public Gains....Pages 173-194 The Sustainability Challenge for Climate Change: Balancing Inter- and Intragenerational Equity....Pages 195-214 Megacities and Global Accords....Pages 215-225 Research in Partnership with Developing Countries: Application of the Method of Material Flux Analysis in Tunja, Colombia....Pages 227-240 Unidentified contributors discuss how human activities in vast urban agglomerations affect global, regional, and local environments, particularly in terms of the consumption and alteration of natural resources. They also examine how urban institutions emerging from the concentration of human talent and influence can imagine and build a sustainable world. Members of the Alliance are mostly from corporations; the series will report research into emerging barriers to sustainable development and methodologies and tools to help overcome them. The volume is not indexed. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR Cities are far more than the sinks of energy, vast drains of natural resources, and obstacles to sustainable development. Properly managed, cities can be transformative arenas in which raw materials may be rationally and economically developed to support people and whole regions sustainably. This book provides ideas for managing the mega-cities. FOR at least 4000 years, cities have been centers of cultural, social, technological and economic innovation, inventions and their application, and political power.