ISSUE ONE | MAY - AUGUST 2017
CREATING SUSTAINABLE CITIES JOURNAL
www.creatingsustainablecities.org.uk
CREATING SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Monique is CEO of the Thomson Reuters Foundation and founder of TrustLaw and Trust Conference.
Tim is Arup’s Project Director for the UK Autodrive consortium.
PROJECT DIRT
Gyorgyi is a PhD candidate at Royal College of Art and works as a Design Researcher at the Future Cities Catapult.
Cath is the Director of Global Partnerships at Project Dirt.
BRIGHTON & HOVE CITY COUNCIL
RICH HOWORTH
Rich works as the Programme Manager of the Brighton & Lewes Downs UNESCO World Biosphere Region.
CONSULTANT
JONATHAN BRODERICK
ASHDEN FUTURE CITIES CATAPULT
GYORGYI GALK
Alex is Ashden’s Schools Programme Manager.
CATH PRISK
Goran is a Professor of Energy Systems at Imperial College London.
ARUP
MONIQUE VILLA
THOMSON REUTERS FOUNDATION
To suggest an abstract for a future article or to promote an upcoming event please email chrislivemore@ibexearth.com. The next edition will be published in August.
GORAN STRBAC
With thanks to Imperial College London, Thomson Reuters Foundation, Arup, Ashden, Brighton & Hove City Council, Future Cities Catapult and Project Dirt.
TIM ARMITAGE
CONTRIBUTIONS
IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON
Creating Sustainable Cities is a new electronic journal exploring how the UK’s cities and towns can embed sustainability into their urban landscapes. It aims to bring together leading figures from the public, private, third and academic sectors and demonstrate successful sustainable city projects and seeks solutions to some of the most pressing challenges our cities and towns now face in terms of delivering clean energy, reducing traffic congestion and improving air quality - all key elements of a sustainable city.
ALEX GREEN
Issue One | May - August 2017
Jonathan is a London-based researcher, writer and urbanist.
An initiative designed to make urban environments more sustainable by delivering innovative solutions to common challenges faced by the UK’s cities and towns. www.creatingsustainablecities.org.uk
PROFESSOR GORAN STRBAC
[ENERGY]
Imperial College London
A Low Carbon Energy Future: Coordinating City & National Objectives
Challenges of Energy Decarbonisation
With an ever growing share of the global population cities are central to economic growth and are hives of social activity. Increasingly, the need of cities to improve performance in services and infrastructure is creating not only technical, social, and business challenges, but also opportunities as new niches are opened and new technologies emerge. Information about infrastructure performance, capability, user activity, and intent is increasingly becoming a key-driver to improving efficiency and growth of new services, leading to the development of the sustainable, smart city. In terms of energy, it is important to consider the interaction between local city level development objectives and those at the national level. Cities consume more than 80% of the total energy produce and are responsible for 80% of its greenhouse gas emissions.
The UK energy sector is facing challenges of unprecedented proportions in order to deliver an efficient and secure transition to a low-carbon future. Cities consume more than 80% of total energy production and are responsible for 80% of its greenhouse gas emissions. Under conditions of resource scarcity and climate change, future cities could, in addition to lowering energy demand, provide significant flexibility in helping to reduce the costs of de-carbonisation integration systems and help tackle carbon emissions at the national level. Future grids in sustainable, smart cities with appropriate enabling technologies will facilitate the paradigm shift in delivering resilience and security of energy supply in urban environments. Citizen engagement and participation will be an essential component if we are to deliver cost effective decarbonisation at both the individual city and at the national level.
Under conditions of resource scarcity and climate change, future cities could, in addition to lowering energy demand, provide significant flexibility and support in reducing the costs associated with decarbonising energy systems at the national level. Over the coming decades, the UK energy sector will need to overcome huge challenges in order to evolve towards a low-carbon system. According to the Government plans, significant carbon reductions that are expected by 2030 will be based on deployment of renewable and nuclear generation technologies combined with the electrification of segments of heat and transport sectors. Traditional business-as-usual infrastructure planning combined with a high penetration of variable and inflexible low-carbon generation may result in prohibitive system integration costs, curtailment of low-carbon generation (potentially exceeding 25% in 2030) and significant degradation in infrastructure asset utilization (from 55% today to less that 30% in 2030).
Facilitating a Cost Effective Transition to a Low-Carbon Future
If the energy infrastructure utilisation is not to degrade but rather (potentially) be enhanced, the system resilience and security that has been traditionally delivered through asset redundancy would need to be provided through more sophisticated control that incorporates advanced technologies, supported by appropriate communication and information technologies. In this context, technology options such as flexible commercial, industrial and domestic demand, energy storage of various forms, local back-up generation etc, could provide the flexibility to reverse these trends and facilitate a cost-effective transition towards a lowcarbon energy system. This will enable cost effective operation of the system at both national and local city level while enhancing the resilience of the electricity supply delivered to end consumers through active, real time network control of the local district grids, as indicated in Figure 1. In this context, future grids in smart cities with appropriate enabling technologies will facilitate the paradigm shift in delivering resilience and security of supply in tomorrow’s cities and urban environments. National energy objectives
Smart Demand Paradigm shi+ in security of supply: from redundancy in assets to intelligence
Energy Storage
Back-up generation
City energy objectives
Figure 1. Integration of national level and city level energy infrastructure to facilitate cost effective and resilient evolution to low carbon future
Ensuring citizen participation and promoting their engagement in energy related issues is an essential element in delivering cost effective low-carbon cities and supporting the UK’s national carbon reduction targets. However, the proliferation of flexibility solutions is at present not fully integrated for a variety of reasons including market, regulatory and policy barriers. Furthermore, information management, disturbance recognition and visualisation tools are yet to be fully developed and implemented to enhance processing of real-time information, accelerate response times to various system disturbances and achieve compliance with reliability criteria at lower costs. This also includes the development of interface technologies and standards to enable seamless integration of flexible distributed energy resources with the local city electricity infrastructure. Although the major ingredients of most of these technologies do exist, the key unresolved challenge is in the development and demonstration of effective energy system integration and real time control, showing that district grids can deliver the functionality and enhance resilience of future low carbon electricity systems.
Carbon Benefits of Electrification of the Transport Sector:
An important interaction between city and national level objectives relates to the electrification of the transport sector. In order to meet citizens’ expectations for local environmental quality, there is significant interest in electrifying taxies and buses in cities, for example Transport for London plan to fully electrify London taxes and buses by 2032. The extent of national level carbon savings due to the electrification of a cities transport sector will vary significantly and depend upon how a city opts to charge electric vehicles (EVs). As shown in Figure 2, the carbon footprint of supplying electricity to EVs with no smart control (Business as Usual) is 26g CO2/ km, while coordinating charging would reduce carbon emissions to 6.25 g CO2/km and fully smart control through V2G (vehicle-to-grid) would actually yield a negative change in emissions of –2 gCO2/km i.e. the carbon emissions from the electricity system may even decrease as the result of fully smart electrification of transport sector. 30 Carbon emissions from supplying ci;es electric transport (gCO2/km)
In addition to the value and significance of innovative low-carbon solutions, citizens will play a fundamental role in the pathway towards a costefficient decarbonisation of the UK’s cities and, in turn, the national energy system.
25 20 15 10 5 0 -‐5
BaU
Smart sched.
Fully smart
Figure 2. The carbon footprint of supplying EVs with electricity and how it can vary depending upon how a city opts to charge the EVs.
Key drivers for reducing the emissions associated with the smart charging of vehicles in urban environments include reduced renewable output curtailment and a more efficient operation of conventional generation units. Hence, V2G concept, resulting in a negative emission increment, would make the electrification of city transport additionally attractive from the national perspective. In economic terms, this implies that in the fully smart V2G paradigm, electric vehicles should get paid for smart charging as this would lead to the savings in deployment rates of lowcarbon technologies and innovations that would help to meet the UK’s national carbon reduction targets. It is important to bear in mind that emissions in both smart and non-smart cases are significantly lower than the emissions associated with internal combustion engines of around 125 g CO2 /km, suggesting that there is a clear emission benefit for society from a large-scale rollout of electrification of the transport sector.
Integrated Planning & Coordination Moving Towards a Strategic Approach:
Furthermore, recent research has demonstrated that the heat sector may present substantial opportunities for energy storage and thereby support a more cost effective integration of renewable generation with limited predictability and controllability. This way, an integrated planning and coordination of multiple energy systems benefits consumers by providing an alternative solution that ensures security of supply at reduced costs, both economic and environmental. In addition, there is significant scope to apply smart technologies and concepts that will enhance energy efficiency in cities and unlock additional savings. Innovative concepts for intelligent street lighting like dimming, on-demand lighting and LED technology benefits citizens with a safer experience but can also benefit local authorities by creating economies of scale, collective access to providers and share of common practices. This change in paradigm from individual to collective procurement and from incremental to smart/strategic city solutions will be fundamental to a costefficient transition to a low carbon future.
MONIQUE VILLA
[COMMUNITY]
Thomson Reuters Foundation
Disrupting Pro Bono Innovation, disruption, acceleration. These words may be common in Palo Alto, but they are also increasingly being used across the philanthropic sector. New players and partnerships are emerging: Governments are teaming up with venture capital funds, citizens are becoming entrepreneurs (via the shared economy), and consumers are increasingly acting like advocates. The legal field is also undergoing significant change. Take pro bono. As law firms continue to expand globally, legal aid has morphed from a box-ticking exercise to a tremendous opportunity to generate both social impact and strong visibility. When I created TrustLaw in 2010, I could never have anticipated that six years later law firms would be actively fighting for pro bono work. This is the case today. How did that happen in such short amount of time? I have a one-word answer: innovation. Since the beginning TrustLaw had three main goals: reach, scale and connectivity. Innovation has been a key driver and success factor in the development of the programme. Through trial and error and constant adjustments, we have built a brand new ecosystem, one able to accelerate the impact of lawyer’s “brainpower” globally. TrustLaw was built with one core principle in mind: global reach. I was convinced then – as I am today – that if implemented globally pro bono has the potential to deliver meaningful social progress.
Monique Villa with the winners of the 2016 TrustLaw Awards, an annual ceremony celebrating high-impact pro bono projects in the TrustLaw network.
That was not the case when we entered the market. Back in 2010, the only countries where pro bono legal assistance was organised and structured were the USA, Canada, UK, South Africa and Australia. As a result, lawyers were mostly providing assistance locally, with limited results. Pro bono was a big idea trapped in a small box. Something had to change.
The other innovative principle at the heart of TrustLaw was scale. We would act as an impact multiplier, and instead of facilitating legal assistance to single individuals, we would connect lawyers to NGOs and social enterprises around the world. Not only would we reach a bigger pool of beneficiaries, but we would also capitalise on the growing interest of the philanthropic sector in socially minded businesses.
TrustLaw’s first step was perhaps the most disruptive: We removed all boundaries. Since its launch, TrustLaw has been connecting law firms – large and small – with clients around the world. Through TrustLaw, a lawyer can provide assistance to clients facing challenges that transcend borders, constitutions and languages, enhancing the spread and depth of pro bono work in jurisdictions relatively unfamiliar to the practice, and where the rule of law is weakest.
The third pillar of TrustLaw has always been technology. By implementing an innovative vetting system, we were able to take such responsibility off the law firms, speeding up processes and facilitating connections. Today, our Web-based portal is the point of entry for thousands of lawyers, NGOs and social enterprises. Every week, the TrustLaw team facilitates new connections thanks to its in-house team of lawyers, project managers and outreach specialists.
This not only addresses the gaps in justice that still plague the most vulnerable, it also allows NGOs and social enterprises to devote their precious resources to their missions, rather than legal fees.
From day-to-day legal issues to ambitious cross-border research programmes, our smart use of technology has allowed NGOs, social enterprises, law firms and in-house legal teams in disparate locations to connect on innovative projects.
We have supported grassroots organisations to employ their first staff members, helped vulnerable women access loans to start their first businesses and brought renewable energy lighting to slums. Free legal assistance on these projects has made a significant impact on local communities working to overcome poverty and discrimination. Today TrustLaw is expanding beyond transactional support, engaging not only in operational legal issues faced by NGOs and social enterprises, but also in major cross-border research projects addressing some of the most under-reported and unaddressed global issues. Our research has supported advocacy efforts to combat sex discrimination, changed laws to strengthen the rights of the LGBT community, improved policies to help diagnose HIV/AIDs, and crafted tools to deliver justice for victims of human trafficking and slavery.
In less than six years, TrustLaw has become the world’s largest facilitator of free legal services, generating the equivalent of $85 million in pro bono “brain hours� helping high-impact NGOs and social enterprises achieve their mission. We currently have over 3,800 members across more than 175 countries, including more than 600 law firms and over 3,100 high-impact social enterprises and NGOs at the frontlines of social change. To see how NGOs and social enterprises in your region can benefit from the services offered by TrustLaw then please visit: www.trust.org/trustlaw
TIM ARMITAGE
[TRANSPORT]
ARUP
The Urban Mobility Revolution: how UK Autodrive is leading the way We are standing at the beginning of a revolution in the way in which people move around our urban environments. Advances in mobility systems and the general digitisation of transport are set to provide new and exciting ways to travel and will change how existing modes deliver transport services. The UK is one of the leading countries developing technology and demonstrating how urban mobility will change. UK Government’s Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV) is supporting developments through funding mechanisms and by preparing a legislative framework that supports the developing innovations.
It is only through public acceptance that the urban mobility revolution will be a success.
One such collaborative endeavour is the government and industry-funded UK Autodrive project. Within UK Autodrive, leading organisations from across the automotive industry and from academia are working with two forward-thinking cities Milton Keynes and Coventry - to explore and demonstrate the future of urban mobility. In the first of three strands of the project, Jaguar Land Rover, Ford and Tata Motors European Technical Centre are collaborating to demonstrate how advances in passenger car connectivity and automation will eventually evolve into vehicles that can operate autonomously in and around cities. Having already demonstrated a number of connected and autonomous features at the Horiba MIRA
test facility earlier this year, further more complex demonstrations are planned for the spring of 2017. The project will then move its vehicles and demonstrations to the roads of Milton Keynes and Coventry later in the year. In the near future the vehicles will share information between themselves and will use data provided by the cities to deliver mobility in an efficient and effective way. For instance, on the approach to a city centre a connected car may identify that the occupants wish to park in a particular area and the city will respond by providing the location of a suitable vacant parking space. The car will then automatically and safely drive to that location. In parallel to the evolution of passenger vehicles, UK Autodrive is developing an innovative new form of ‘last mile’ mobility. RDM Group, an advanced automotive technology company in Coventry, is developing a range of fully autonomous vehicles which are designed to operate deep into urban environments, sharing space with pedestrians and other users of the urban public realm.
FIND OUT MORE ABOUT UK AUTODRIVE: www.ukautodrive.com
These ‘pods’ have been designed to operate safely in a complex environment and will provide a low-speed autonomous transport system, which will complement existing modes of transport. They will also extend urban public transport services to groups of residents and workers, such as the mobility and sight impaired, who may find it difficult to use existing urban transport services. UK Autodrive will begin to introduce pods into Central Milton Keynes during 2017. In2018 there are plans to operate a demonstration public transport system using a fleet of 40 pods to provide an on-demand, anywhere-to-anywhere mobility service. None of this would be possible without the cooperation of industry, government and local authorities. Innovative technical developments, together with review and amendment of the legislative framework, are enabling progressive cities to engage and help shape the future of urban mobility. In the UK Autodrive project, Milton Keynes and Coventry play a key role in bringing connected and autonomous vehicle technologies into everyday use. The cities are amongst a small number of international urban laboratories
where future systems are being trialled, developed and demonstrated. The economic well-being of cities and their ability to grow sustainably is linked directly to the efficient and effective movement of people and goods. Milton Keynes and Coventry are using UK Autodrive to identify the benefits that connected and autonomous vehicles can bring to bear on some of the real urban mobility issues which are being experienced as the cities grow and develop. The cities are also working with the providers of mobility systems to understand the role they can play in making the cities an easy place for connected and autonomous vehicles to operate. UK Autodrive’s programme of trials and demonstrations will help to identify which systems are best provided by the city and which are best provided within the vehicle itself. Physical trials are being complemented by research work with the University of Cambridge and the University of Oxford to help answer questions around the effects of connected and autonomous vehicles on congestion and air quality; the scalability of future mobility systems and the business models that will enable adoption of the technology. Perhaps most importantly of all, UK Autodrive is undertaking a series of public attitude surveys in which the programme will monitor the changing attitudes and opinions of citizens who will be served by these exciting new forms of urban transport. And it is only through public acceptance that the urban mobility revolution will be a success.
TIM ARMITAGE ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, ARUP Tim Armitage is Arup’s Project Director for the UK Autodrive consortium, one of three successful projects in the UK Government’s ‘Introducing Driverless Cars’ competition. Tim is an Associate Director at Arup who has delivered collaborative programmes across a range of transport sectors, most recently in the area of sustainable mobility. Arup is an independent firm of designers, planners, engineers and consultants and is lead partner for the UK Autodrive project.
We understand that urbanisation is an unprecedented challenge and are responding to this by integrating our advisory services in strategy development, planning, finance, economics, consultation and operations with our key strengths in design, engineering and implementation. We want to enable city governments, urban communities, infrastructure providers, developers and investors to determine their own future rather than simply reacting to external pressures. You can find out more about Tim’s work at Arup by visiting: www.arup.com
ALEX GREEN
[ENERGY]
Ashden
Galvanising a future generation to help create a low-carbon world Ashden’s LESS CO2 programme is helping to create more sustainable schools – as well as galvanising young people to join the movement for a low-carbon world. Many of us are worried about rising fuel costs and climate change but are overwhelmed by the challenges. Just how can schools save energy, keep a lid on their fuel bills and reduce their CO2 emissions? Ashden established the LESS CO2 programme, supported by Bank of America Merrill Lynch, in 2010 in response to requests from schools for practical, hands-on support to help them make the changes they need to reduce their energy bills and to help build a low-carbon future. Staff receive expert advice and resources at four half-day workshops spread across a year, working with up to 15 local schools in a geographic cluster. Between workshops schools are encouraged to put their newfound knowledge to good use to reduce energy use (and bills!) and then share their experiences at subsequent workshops. All participating schools are supported with mentoring from Ashden Award-winning schools. As well as saving energy – and cutting costs and carbon emissions - the LESS CO2 programme is helping teaching staff to inspire students to create solutions and educate future leaders about sustainability, and also engage colleagues in improving the school environment.
“LESS CO2 has helped the children take up more responsibility in the school, and helped them to make others aware of the impact that they are having on the environment.” - PARTICIPATING TEACHER
Schools that have taken part in the LESS CO2 programme have gone on to save an average of £2,648 and 10 tonnes of carbon each year. Data from 41 schools that have completed the programme so far shows that they have saved a total of 411 tonnes of CO2 and £108,564 in one year. To put this in context, each person in the UK produces an average of 10 tonnes of CO2 every year. More than 250 schools have taken part in the programme to date, and Ashden is aiming to work with 3,000 UK schools in total over the next five years.
TO FIND OUT MORE... Email alex.green@ashden.org
Energy saving tips for Schools Drawing on the experience of schools who have participated in LESS CO2, here are some of their top tips to help other schools along their own energy management journey:
Switch off the lights
Students and staff should be responsible for ensuring that all the lights are turned off in the classroom when they are empty. Make sure that daylight and motion sensors are not turning lights on when they are not needed. Reward classes that remember to turn off all the lights in their classrooms. Ask students to carry out regular checks at break times, lunchtimes or after school.
Room temperature
Don’t overheat your school – generally classrooms only need to be heated to 18-19 °C. Make sure you’re not overheating areas like corridors, bathrooms and storage areas. Turn the heating down or off in areas where it’s not needed. If possible, use zoning so that areas can be maintained at the right temperature. Avoid plug-in storage or fan heaters. If staff or students complain about being cold, ask them to wear more layers!
Heating timing
Manage your heating controls and timing to ensure that your school is only heated when absolutely necessary. By reducing the time that your heating is running by just 10 or 20 minutes per day, you can save a lot over the year. The school doesn’t need to be fully heated by the time the first early bird arrives for work! Just make sure it’s at a comfortable temperature when most staff arrive, and getting cooler when most leave at the end of the day.
Switch off computers
It’s a simple rule – if it’s not being used, turn it off. Equipment like screens, whiteboards, printers and photocopiers should only be turned on when they’re actually needed. Automatic power-down systems can be installed on most computer networks to do this for you.
Conserve heat
Make sure that you’re not simply heating the air around your schools by insulating all your roofs and walls, making sure that windows and doors don’t have drafts. Insulate your pipes throughout your school to conserve the heat in your water. Close doors to keep heat in.
Make use of sunlight
Keep all the windows clear of any displays, posters and blinds to ensure that you are making the most of natural sunlight. Not only will this make the classrooms a more pleasant working environment, but it will also mean that you shouldn’t need the lights on as much.
Green clubs
Students can be a fantastic source of ideas and inspiration, and will come up with their own creative ideas to save energy. Give them ownership and responsibility in their energy saving actions. Start up an Energy Saving Club – give them all a badge and ask them to put on an assembly. Listen to their views and ideas and make sure that their efforts are rewarded.
If you would like to register a school’s interest in joining LESS CO2 then it really couldn’t be easier simply visit: www.lessco2.org.uk
Exploring the Brighton & Lewes Downs UNESCO Biosphere “Our Biosphere’s mission is to serve as an international demonstration area for sustainable development” - RICH HOWORTH
All images © Rich Howorth
RICH HOWORTH
[NATURE]
Brighton & Hove City Council The Brighton & Lewes Downs, now promoted as the ‘Living Coast’, was recognised as an international “site of excellence” by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) in 2014, when it became a World Biosphere Region – part of a global family of 670 sites spread across 120 countries. We explore what this has meant to the region with an article by the Biosphere Programme Manager, Rich Howorth. There are now a total of six UNESCO Biosphere Regions to be found in the UK, stretching from Devon to the north-west Scottish Highlands. Yet, the Brighton & Lewes Downs Biosphere is the only location in the UK where a city is at its heart - cities such as Sao Paolo, Cape Town and Agadir also hold a similar accolade. Covering an area of land and sea larger than the nearby Isle of Wight, our Biosphere brings together the towns, downs and coast between Shoreham and Newhaven, with the city of Brighton & Hove as the central point. The local population numbers some 370,000 people, augmented by more than twelve million visitors each year. Beyond its enduring popularity as a seaside resort and cultural centre, Brighton boasts some important natural assets ranging from its role as host to the National Elm Collection (including the two largest English Elm trees in the world) and extensive networks of urban greenspace that connect to the chalk downland of the South Downs National Park. Greenspace plays a vital role in providing for the needs of the local population through the provision of ‘ecosystem services’, as recognised as far back as a hundred years ago – when the former Brighton Corporation
bought up large areas of surrounding downland to ensure the functions of water supply and open space for recreation. Such greenspace is under increasing pressure however, especially as local authority budgets reduce and public demand grows, with environmental challenges as diverse as poor land management, groundwater pollution from nitrates, increasing surface water flood risk from intense storms, and health impacts during heat waves. The Living Coast’s mission is to pioneer a positive future that better connects people and nature. As such we are progressing a diverse range of projects to try to address some of the local challenges that we face, working across our partnership of some forty organisations and bidding for external funding support where possible to deliver improvements. The challenge now is to scale up the size and impact of such projects by applying them more widely, supported by new policy development, major funding bids, and increased collaboration between the public, private and voluntary sectors.
The Brighton & Lewes Downs Biosphere has instigated and inspired some incredible work in the region:
Detailed mapping of green infrastructure, including new online maps for the public. Conservation land management including urban grazing, supported by Environmental Stewardship schemes. Habitat creation of chalk wildflower ‘butterfly banks’, as part of a ‘Nature Improvement Area’. Civic planting for pollinators, including public ‘bee bed’ demonstrator plots. Pilot SUDS schemes creating ‘rain gardens’ in urban parks. Innovative outdoor and virtual world learning for children, about the local water cycle. Developing the capacity of local greenspace groups, to work with each other and the Council. To find out more about the Brighton & Lewes Downs Biosphere programme visit: www.thelivingcoast.org.uk.
GYORGYI GALIK & JONATHAN BRODERICK
[AIR POLLUTION]
Future Cities Catapult
When awareness only goes so far: Reframing the narrative around air pollution How would you rate the air quality in the room you’re sitting in now? Is it poor, fair, or excellent? If you think it’s poor, does that matter? Is there anything you could do to improve it? What if I told you that your drinking water was contaminated? Would you simply drink it? If not, then why do you accept that the air you breathe every day is heavily polluted? With more people living in cities than ever before, urban air quality has become a serious concern. Paris recently suffered its worst air pollution in a decade, and London broke its annual limit for air pollution within the first five days of 2017. According to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2016) more than 80 per cent of people living in urban areas that monitor air pollution are exposed to air quality levels exceeding safe limits. In 2016, the WHO identified “air pollution [as] the largest single environmental health risk and a leading cause of disease and death affecting the cardiovascular and respiratory systems globally”. Evidence suggests that as urban air quality declines, the risk of lung cancer, and chronic and acute respiratory diseases increases significantly. Alongside these illnesses, air pollution has also been attributed to increased rates of ischaemic heart disease and stroke – a fact which much of the public is still unaware.
Pollution is particularly damaging to the health of children. Exposure to vehicular air pollution during pregnancy, infancy or childhood has been associated with delays in cognitive development (Woodward et al., 2015; Sunyer et al., 2015; Wilker et al., 2015). And numerous studies (Gauderman et al. 2004; Mudway, 2012; Donnelly, 2015; Tabola; 2015; Walton et al., 2015) suggest that air pollution has adverse effects on lung function and development. One in particular found that children who attend primary schools in neighbourhoods with high pollution have up to 10 per cent less lung capacity than their peers. While shortening their life-expectancies this makes them more likely to suffer from increased rates of respiratory illnesses such as asthma and bronchitis. It is important to note that this is an issue of not only of health and well-being but also inequality; the most polluted urban areas tend to also be the areas with the lowest property values.
Given this worrying information, what can be done? Making the invisible, visible Instrumenting the city has become a popular way for local governments to understand and measure environmental health risks, such as noise, heat and air pollution. Cities around the world have been deploying networks of air quality sensors on the basis that better, more granular data will help inform policy-making and legislation aimed at improving air pollution. In parallel to government and intergovernmental initiatives, the citizen-sensing movement and private sensor-vendors have been developing sensing applications of their own. While the latter are mostly commercially driven, the former aim to democratise the collection of environmental data and thereby engage citizens in environmental health issues directly. But how effective are these practices of citizen sensing? Can these initiatives give rise to new modes of environmental awareness and action? (Gabrys, 2013). How might these applications improve the legitimacy of public decision making and give citizens opportunities for greater degrees of participation?
Monitoring air quality is a critical step towards improving air pollution. Air quality data can allow cities and citizens to evaluate the efficacy of their interventions and help regulators enforce current legislation. But sensing alone is insufficient when it comes to addressing the complexity and sources of pollution. In my work as a designer and researcher, I have studied a variety of public and private air sensing infrastructures and applications. To name but a few of the hundreds of applications currently available on the market, these include CleanSpace, Smart Citizen Kit, and the Air Quality Egg. Many of these applications fail to bridge the gap between awareness and action; they fail to understand people’s values, attitudes and actual behaviour. Many also simplify how pollution is produced and downplayed in different contexts. Few take into consideration how politics, economic interests and public narratives can determine how cities and citizens respond to pollution. If sensing alone is not enough, what else can be done to improve air quality?
We already know the major sources of outdoor air pollution in cities: burning fossil fuels for power generation, heating and transportation releases particulates and toxins that are harmful to human health. While there are various interventions related to all of these areas that could significantly improve outdoor air quality, this article will focus on those that could reduce traffic emissions – or the wide variety of pollutants released from petrol and diesel vehicles. Making public transport cleaner and more attractive:
It is generally accepted that increased public transit ridership and making public transport cleaner would greatly improve urban air quality. In an ideal world, this transit would also be powered by renewable energy sources (Zero Carbon Futures, 2016). Getting people out of their cars and into public transit in the first place depends on making it attractive to potential users. Evidence shows that the two biggest factors in doing this are service reliability and frequency (PTUA, 2016). This was best demonstrated in Curitiba, Brazil, in the early 1990s when the city revamped its bus rapid transit (BRT) system with an improved station design and a universal payment system (Reed, 2015).
Reducing the impact and appeal of driving:
Cities should take steps to reduce both the impact and appeal of driving. The impact could be reduced by enforcing stricter emissions standards on both diesel and petrol cars. Private and public vehicles should be tested more frequently, based on real-world rather than laboratory emissions. Cities could also reduce air pollution by encouraging drivers to change their driving
behaviour. If drivers were to adopt more efficient driving practices – such as minimising engine idling, maintaining steady speeds, and avoiding sharp acceleration and braking – they could significantly reduce their fuel consumption and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions (Global Action Plan, 2015; Department for Transport, 2016). Evidence shows that driver training can lead to a lasting decrease in fuel use (and the equivalent in terms of CO2) of up to 6.5-10 per cent (Department for Transport, 2016). To reduce the appeal of driving, cities may consider the introduction of various congestion charging schemes, as found in London, Singapore and Stockholm (Kazis, 2012). While increasing the marginal cost of driving, such schemes can raise funds for investment in new infrastructure and cleaner public transit. Nottingham City Council, for example, recently introduced a type of charging scheme known as the Workplace Parking Levy (WPL), which charges employers who provide their staff with parking. Revenue raised from the WPL goes toward an extension of the city’s tram system, the redevelopment of the central rail station and supports a popular bus network. Though increasing the costs of parking is often politically unpopular, it is one of the most effective ways to influence behaviour (Buehler and Hamre, 2014).
To reduce the appeal and impact of driving in the most densely populated or busiest parts of the city, local governments may also consider introducing a Low, Ultra-low, or Zero Emission Zone (LEZ, ULEZ or ZEZ). These zones aim to improve local air quality in a specific area of the city by either imposing a charge on vehicles that fail to meet certain emissions standards or by banning polluting vehicles altogether. In 2008 London introduced its first Low Emission Zone. Covering most of Greater London, it was intended to encourage the most polluting heavy diesel vehicles driving in the Capital to become cleaner. The city has plans to augment the LEZ in 2020 with an Ultra-low Emission Zone or ULEZ. This new zone will cover considerably less area than the LEZ, but it will be much more comprehensive, affecting all cars, motorcycles, vans, minibuses, busses, coaches and trucks. To discourage the use of polluting vehicles in the meantime, the city will introduce a Toxicity Charge (or T-charge) later this year, which will apply to vehicles that fail to meet the required Euro emissions standards. Though all of these measures are a step in the right direction, some argue that they should go much further. For example, according to a Transport for London (TfL) assessment the T-charge will save 1-3 per cent of NOx (nitrogen oxides) emissions – which it describes as only ‘a minor improvement’ (Nierynck, 2017). Other cities are taking a more drastic approach to reducing car use, moving towards either a ban on cars completely or a ban on diesel cars, as a first step. A few of the cities leading this car-free movement include: Madrid, Oslo, Brussels, Hamburg, Copenhagen, New York, Athens, Mexico City and Vancouver. Oslo plans to permanently ban all cars from its city center by 2019 — in anticipation of a country-wide ban in 2025. To make this possible, the Norwegian capital will invest heavily in public transit and replace more than 50 kilometres of road space currently dedicated to cars with bike lanes (Garfield, 2017).
Encouraging active and sustainable travel walking and cycling: In the UK, it is estimated that at least 60 per cent of car journeys in urban areas are between two and five miles (Sustrans, 2013). Cities should encourage people to make these short journeys through cycling or a combination of public transit and walking (otherwise known as active travel).
There is no single intervention that will encourage cycling on its own. Getting people out of their cars and onto a bike requires a combination of actions. To name a few, cities should re-allocate road space to provide better physical safety for cyclists (with consideration for elements such as traffic proximity, speed limits, visibility, safer intersections, and access to maintenance facilities). To make cycling more appealing for commuting (and not just leisure) cities should also consider the flow of cycling – or the ease with which cyclists can move from point A to B without interruptions such as red lights, traffic and pedestrians. Copenhagen is a good example of a city that has put several of these elements into practice. To improve flow, the city introduced the Green Wave, a technology that coordinates the traffic lights for cyclists (Copenhagenize, 2014). If cyclists ride at a speed of 20 km during the morning rush hour, they will hit green lights all the way into the city. To improve safety, the city introduced pulled back stop-lines for cars; a three-second advance on green lights for cyclists; and painted cycle paths to guide cyclists through busy intersections. The city has also taken steps to foster a cycling culture by introducing features such as extra-wide cycle tracks, so families and friends can chat while commuting to work together. Today, over half of Copenhagen’s population bikes to work every day and it boasts one of the lowest rates of car ownership in Europe (Garfield, 2017).
The Importance of Public Narratives: Mediation and False Representation
A new narrative: Beyond sensing and fig-leaf interventions For most people, air pollution is still invisible. Few are aware of the serious health risks that they are exposed to every day. Awareness of air pollution is highly mediated. The way that we experience pollution is mediated by ways of visualization, mapping and measuring equipment, as well as narratives presented by the media, politicians and experts. Therefore how these representations are produced matters (Kuchinskaya, 2014).
Achieving a commitment to cleaner air will depend on the narratives that are communicated to the public by the government, the media and those with political or economic influence. As Olga Kuchinskaya explains in her book The Politics of Invisibility (2014) public visibility [of pollution] depends on whose voices can be heard and which groups have institutional and infrastructural support”. In short, the way that pollution is represented to the public will determine whether its impacts are observable and publicly visible, or unobservable and therefore publicly nonexistent. There are numerous examples of pollution being falsely represented to manipulate public opinion in the favour of economic or political interests. In 2013, for instance, the Chinese state broadcaster CCTV and the widely read tabloid the Global Times said that smog could be strategically valuable to the military, as it could hinder the use of guided missiles. In the same story, they listed other benefits of smog, including helping to unify Chinese people by making them more equal (Rauhala, 2013; Reuters, 2013).
While this is an extreme example, there are many other cases where environmental pollution was misrepresented with pernicious effects. For more, I encourage you to read Kuchinskaya’s book about Chernobyl, Eric Klinenberg’s social autopsy of the 1995 Chicago heat wave and Tom Gill’s book on how Japan coped with the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster and evacuation process (Gill et al, 2011). Fostering a culture change around the ways that people perceive pollution and its related health risks is a major challenge. Artists, academics, creative technologists and many organisations such as Carbon Arts, Cape Farewell, Citizen Sense, Shrinking Place, CoClimate, the Environmental Health Clinic and Invisible Dust, just to name a few, have been committed to doing this for many years. Applying creative insights, speculations and visions, they produce projects that help the public to better understand the risks and challenges associated with air pollution. The question is how do we convert this awareness into sustained civic and political action?
Currently citizens are presented with the simplistic narrative that gives them little agency to tackle air pollution. They are told they can either change their behaviour to reduce their personal impact on pollution or minimise their exposure to its harmful effects by downloading apps and visualisations. In essence, they are given the false impression that pollution is an inevitable phenomenon over which they have little or no control.
In addressing air quality, many local and national governments currently rely on fig leaf interventions that have only marginal impacts. For example, many city governments take an instrumental approach that assumes that sensing will eventually lead to air quality improvements by providing increased awareness of the problem. But tackling the sources of air pollution will ultimately require more drastic interventions, and a new and more imaginative narrative that is realistic about the agency held by citizens, governments, and businesses to effect change. One possible narrative might call for changing the systems that lock us into the behaviours and practices that produce pollution. When considering this narrative, I am reminded of something Buckminster Fuller said during an interview with the New Yorker in 1966:
Transitioning towards healthier urban environments will require a paradigm shift around what kind of cities we expect to live in. Clean air should be a basic human right; it should not be a moral question that depends on the goodwill of individuals or private interests.
“I made up my mind at this point that I would never try to reform man—that’s much too difficult. What I would do was to try to modify the environment in such a way as to get man moving in preferred directions.” 1
GYORGYI GALIK:
JONATHAN BRODERICK
Gyorgyi Galik is a London-based innovation designer and design researcher. She is in her second year of PhD studies in Innovation Design Engineering at Royal College of Art in London. Alongside her studies, she is working as a Design Researcher at Future Cities Catapult. Gyorgyi’s practice focuses on voluntary social change. In particular, she’s interested in how we can transform socioecological systems and our collective relationship towards these systems, to address and respond to contemporary urban challenges.
1 Please find all references made in the article on the following link here.
Jonathan Broderick is a London-based researcher, writer and urbanist. He has worked with government bodies, local authorities, universities and private sector organisations on projects at the national, city and neighbourhood scales. He was a founding member of the Future Cities Catapult and a part of the team at Arup Foresight. He holds an MSc in City Design and Social Science from the London School of Economics. Follow him on Twitter @jonbroderick.
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Project Dirt
Get involved in Outdoor Classroom Day Thursday 18th May 2017
www.outdoorclassroomday.org.uk
“We are living in an age of unprecedented uncertainty and change. Nobody has a clue what the world will look like in five years’ time. And yet we’re educating children for it.”, says Sir Ken Robinson. What can we do? How about joining in Outdoor Classroom Day, a global campaign to celebrate and inspire learning and play outside the classroom?
intelligence. It’s how they learn who they are and who they might become. It’s also how they are happiest.
Learning outdoors is not new, but in 2017 we have more evidence than ever before that shows the powerful impact it has on students and teachers. Natural England recently showed that 92 per cent of teachers involved in their four year trial said that having lessons outdoors improved pupils engagement with learning, and 94 per cent said it also improved their health and well-being.
Back in 2011, Anna Portch, an Environmental Education activist, was inspired by Tim Gill’s Sowing the Seeds report to develop the original campaign. In 2012, a handful of London schools got involved. From there, it has grown into an international movement — in 2016 almost half a million children across over 50 countries got outdoors to play and learn as part of their school day.
Most of the teachers involved also said that outdoor learning made them feel happier about their own teaching experience too! Children’s outdoor play can be even more powerful. In their play children develop imaginary worlds that they can control, where they can triumph over disaster.
If you’re new to outdoor learning, or your school doesn’t yet have a play policy, why not use the day to have a go? Or if it’s part of your normal week, why not use the day to celebrate what you’re doing already and encourage other schools in your area to join in? .
They can develop new games and test out ways of behaving and ideas. They are physically active and emotionally engaged. This behaviour is important. It is how they build up a repertoire of flexible responses to situations they create and encounter. And that’s how they build confidence, resilience, teamwork and emotional
Whatever you decide to do, get started on your Outdoor Classroom Day adventure on 18 th May and be prepared to be amazed! Join the movement today by signing up your class — or whole school —at www.outdoorclassroomday.org.uk and www.projectdirt.com.
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