cities

Seattle Municipal Archives, courtesy flickr

In many ways meeting the challenge of climate change and sustainable development is often most effective at the municipal level. Cities strike a balance between meeting the diverse needs of its inhabitants with the ability to adopt and adapt to the realities and challenges of global warming, development, infrastructure and energy.[read more]

What does it take to make a community friendly to electric vehicles (EV)? The Electric Drive Transportation Association has a pretty good idea, and is currently highlighting communities across the country that are employing effective strategies to encourage EV adoption.[read more]

The internet, distributed renewable energy, electric vehicles and energy management are ready to coalesce: the impact on cities and our lives will be profound. The US-China Green Energy Conference (sponsored by the US-China Green Energy Council) held Friday in the Silicon Valley took a deep bi-national dive into what smart grids...[read more]

When the Lovin’ Spoonful released Summer in the City in 1966, they weren’t thinking about climate change. But, it turns out, city dwellers can expect a lot more hot days than country folk, climate models tell us. As the Spoonful put it: Hot town, summer in the city Back of my neck getting dirty and gritty Been down, isn’t it a pity Doesn...[read more]

Siemens Energy CTO Dr. Michael Weinhold

At Hanover Fair I met Dr. Michael Weinhold, chief technology officer of Siemens Energy. Here are his thoughts on how to make cities more energy-efficient.[read more]

Last week for World Water Day (March 22nd, 2011), I participated in an exclusive webinar about how global cities are dealing with the challenge of managing their most essential resource. Listen to the audio at Sustainable Cities Collective (length 01:01:06)    or download here   Panelists included Dr. Paul Bowen...[read more]

TODAY at 1pm, my Fortune magazine colleague Marc Gunther will host an Energy Collective webinar on the eMobility Challenge: Electric Cars and How to Keep Them Charged. Marc's expert guests will tackle the challenge and opportunity of widespread EV adoption, focussing on the various charging network options and their impact...[read more]

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been lauded in the past years as one of the driving forces behind the EU’s increasing goals to combat climate change.  He has also championed talks to try to align former French colonies in Africa in the climate change mitigation and adaptation debate.  Yet, the real changes to how “...[read more]

Climate Risks and Adaptation in Asian Coastal Megacities: Key Findings Frequency of extreme events likely to increase. All three coastal megacities[1] are likely to witness increases in temperature and precipitation linked with climate change and variability. Increase in flood-prone area due to climate change in all three cities. In all...[read more]

It seems like most of the discussion about changes that Smart Grid technologies will introduce focus on changes to utilities and to consumers.  Let’s not forget cities and towns.  It’s becoming very apparent that many technologies that improve the electrical grid can also improve other networks – whether these are water, gas,...[read more]

While national and international action will ultimately be needed to avert catastrophic climate change, serious action on both fronts is not imminent.  In the meantime, local action will be crucial for identifying and testing best practices.  Michael Coren has a good update at the Yale Forum on Climate Change and the Media on...[read more]

Cities have taxpayers and monopoly utility companies have ratepayers. When the city owns the utility, the taxpayers are – more or less – the same group of people as the ratepayers. In this case, does it matter which group pays how much for what? Should, for example, the municipal utility buy vehicles for other city departments? Should...[read more]

State governments aren’t very good at looking out for their golden geese: According to an analysis by The New York Times of 5,274 transportation projects approved so far — the most complete look yet at how states plan to spend their stimulus money — the 100 largest metropolitan areas are getting less than half the money from the biggest...[read more]

Mother Nature Network By Stephanie Rogers If you’re working to reduce your carbon footprint and live in a rural or suburban area, perhaps you should consider moving to the city. It could reduce your transportation carbon emissions by 70 percent, according to data recently added to Chicago-based Center for Neighborhood Technology’s...[read more]

Sounds right: David Goldberg of Transportation for America informs us that “the office is conceived as something of a supercabinet position that potentially could coordinate policy among the Department of Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, environment, public health and other arenas.” Totally sensible. Also Bruce Katz of...[read more]