Energizing Cities: Assessing Urban Energy

This book emerged from the urban section of the Global Energy Assessment. It puts forward an elaborated systemic framework that allows a comparative analysis and assessment of urban energy use in its varied specificities and at its different scales. With approximately 80 per cent of GDP being produced in urban systems and more than 50 per cent of the world’s inhabitants living in urban agglomerations, there is a need to focus on the challenges and opportunities presented by urban settlements in order to effectively assess the issue of energizing cities sustainably. It argues the need for an urban system perspective, which opposes both the measuring of data on a national scale and a definition of the urban in politico-administrative boundaries of the city terms. “Such a functional perspective of urban energy systems highlights that urban locations and their growth [urbanization] are not only the clustering of people and economic activities in space, but also include [the] types of activities they pursue and the infrastructural and framing conditions [service functions] urban agglomerations provide” (page 2). For any measurement, the scale at which the boundary of the urban system is drawn is critical. A good example, discussed further in Chapter 4, is the difference between production and consumption-based energy use. Those countries that are engaged predominantly in the service sector are not producing the high-energy goods they import, even though they consume much, and they score very differently on the two measures. These flexible boundaries, however, and the dependency of meaning on the scale chosen invites political rhetoric and exploitation, which is one reason why sound and qualitatively high analytical tools are required – as well as additional institutional capacity to use them appropriately.
The book comprises three parts − “The Urbanization Context”, “The Urbanization Challenges” and “Urban Policy Opportunities and Responses” – and represents a mix of quantitative and qualitative analysis. While much of the book revolves around quantitative assessment, the urban is considered as fundamentally multi-dimensional and qualitatively different across time and space, requiring therefore context-dependent policy responses (Chapter 3, in particular, discusses “time−geography choreography”). Another important question for policy-making concerns the difficult yet decisive balance between central and local authorities. While energy use also has global determinants that local decision-making cannot influence, the latter should prioritize those issues where the biggest leverage effect can be achieved. Chapter 6 concerns urban poverty and argues that access to energy for all people is less related to energy policy than to how local authorities deal with informal settlements. It provides evidence that when relations between informal dwellers and local governments improve, clean energy and electricity reaches groups of the urban poor. With a prognosis of three billion more urban dwellers in future decades, many of whom are likely to spend some time in informal settlements, the combined local authority approach to housing, infrastructure, energy and transport will have a crucial impact. Further leverage potential is identified for diversity and density, which − given that the co-location of activities means an opportunity for the integration of different energy systems, leading to a more efficient energy use (Chapter 7) − are seen as special strategic assets of urban areas. This opportunity for efficiency gains reinforces the idea that energy demand management is more important than energy supply management (Chapter 11). This is the more so considering the detrimental impact exerted by both excessive and insufficient density – the latter represents a waste of energy (Chapter 7), while the former can fuel air pollution (Chapter 12).

The conclusions emphasize the need to rethink and reform institutional frameworks for intelligent