scholarly journals Correction to: Ranking local climate policy: assessing the mitigation and adaptation activities of 104 German cities

2021 ◽  
Vol 167 (3-4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Antje Otto ◽  
Kristine Kern ◽  
Wolfgang Haupt ◽  
Peter Eckersley ◽  
Annegret H. Thieken
Keyword(s):  
Climate Policy ◽  
Local Climate ◽  
Link Type ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
German Cities

A Correction to this paper has been published: 10.1007/s10584-021-03184-z

scholarly journals Ranking local climate policy: assessing the mitigation and adaptation activities of 104 German cities

2021 ◽  
Vol 167 (1-2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Antje Otto ◽  
Kristine Kern ◽  
Wolfgang Haupt ◽  
Peter Eckersley ◽  
Annegret H. Thieken
Keyword(s):  
Climate Policy ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Climate Adaptation ◽  
City Size ◽  
Climate Mitigation ◽  
Structural Factors ◽  
Local Climate ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
German Cities

AbstractClimate mitigation and climate adaptation are crucial tasks for urban areas and can involve synergies as well as trade-offs. However, few studies have examined how mitigation and adaptation efforts relate to each other in a large number of differently sized cities, and therefore we know little about whether forerunners in mitigation are also leading in adaptation or if cities tend to focus on just one policy field. This article develops an internationally applicable approach to rank cities on climate policy that incorporates multiple indicators related to (1) local commitments on mitigation and adaptation, (2) urban mitigation and adaptation plans and (3) climate adaptation and mitigation ambitions. We apply this method to rank 104 differently sized German cities and identify six clusters: climate policy leaders, climate adaptation leaders, climate mitigation leaders, climate policy followers, climate policy latecomers and climate policy laggards. The article seeks explanations for particular cities’ positions and shows that coping with climate change in a balanced way on a high level depends on structural factors, in particular city size, the pathways of local climate policies since the 1990s and funding programmes for both climate mitigation and adaptation.

scholarly journals Tensions in Urban Transitions. Conceptualizing Conflicts in Local Climate Policy Arrangements

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 78
Author(s):  
Winfried Osthorst
Keyword(s):  
Climate Policy ◽  
Policy Change ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Town Planning ◽  
Ecological Modernization ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Local Climate ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
Policy Arrangements

Academic and political debate places great expectations on cities’ potential for furthering decentralized, bottom-up climate policies. Local policy research acknowledges the role of local agency to develop and implement sustainability, but also acknowledges internal conflicts. This partly reflects tensions between different functions of the local level, and different governance models related to them. In addition, local dependency on higher level competencies, resources, and overarching strategies is discussed. This article proposes a focus on political processes and power relationships between levels of governance, and among relevant domains within cities, to understand the dynamics of policy change towards sustainability. Researching these dynamics within local climate policy arrangements (LCPAs) is proposed as an approach to understanding the complexities of local constellations and contradictions within them. It makes the distinction between “weak” and “strong” ecological modernization, and relates it to two basic rationales for local governance. The resulting typology denotes constellations characterizing policy change ambitions towards local climate policy in crucial domains, including economic development, energy infrastructures, climate change management, town planning and housing, and transportation. This article argues that this approach overcomes the limitations of the predominating conceptualizations of urban carbon control strategies as consistent, and recognises the multi-level dimension of such internal urban processes.

scholarly journals Communicating Climate Mitigation and Adaptation Efforts in American Cities

Climate ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Constantine Boussalis ◽  
Travis Coan ◽  
Mirya Holman
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Policy ◽  
Climate Mitigation ◽  
Computer Assisted ◽  
Press Releases ◽  
City Governments ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Adaptation Policies ◽  
American Cities ◽  
The City

City governments have a large role to play in climate change mitigation and adaptation policies, given that urban locales are responsible for disproportionately high levels of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and are on the “front lines” of observed and anticipated climate change impacts. This study examines how US mayors prioritize climate policies within the context of the city agenda. Employing a computer-assisted content analysis of over 2886 mayoral press releases related to climate change from 82 major American cities for the period 2010–2016, we describe and explain the extent to which city governments discuss mitigation and adaptation policies in official communications. Specifically, we rely on a semi-supervised topic model to measure key climate policy themes in city press releases and examine their correlates using a multilevel statistical model. Our results suggest that while mitigation policies tend to dominate the city agenda on climate policy, discussion of adaptation efforts has risen dramatically in the past few years. Further, our statistical analysis indicates that partisanship influences city discussion on a range of climate policy areas—including emissions, land use policy, and climate resiliency—while projected vulnerability to climatic risks only influences discussion of climate resiliency and adaptation efforts.

scholarly journals Presenting a Framework to Analyze Local Climate Policy and Action in Small and Medium-Sized Cities

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 847 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Hoppe ◽  
Arjen van der Vegt ◽  
Peter Stegmaier
Keyword(s):  
Climate Policy ◽  
Local Climate

Vertical Targeting and Leakage in Carbon Policy

2011 ◽  
Vol 101 (3) ◽  
pp. 263-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
James B Bushnell ◽  
Erin T Mansur
Keyword(s):  
Climate Policy ◽  
Policy Design ◽  
Pollution Source ◽  
Pollution Sources ◽  
External Effects ◽  
Local Climate ◽  
Carbon Policy

This paper examines the intersection between two aspects of climate policy design. The first is the point of regulation: should it be placed on pollution sources, carbon-rich inputs, or consumers? The second aspect concerns the external effects of a local climate policy. Leakage occurs when partial regulation results in an increase in emissions in unregulated parts of the economy. Our model demonstrates how directly regulating polluters can increase foreign emissions while indirect regulation (either upstream or downstream of the pollution source) will decrease foreign emissions. The net effect on combined domestic and foreign emissions will depend on market elasticities.

scholarly journals Projections of the urban and intra-urban scale thermal effects of climate change in the 21st century for cities in the Carpathian Basin

2021 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-33
Author(s):  
Tamás Gál ◽  
Nóra Skarbit ◽  
Gergely Molnár ◽  
János Unger
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Urban Climate ◽  
Thermal Characteristics ◽  
Carpathian Basin ◽  
Climate Index ◽  
Climate Mitigation ◽  
Emission Scenarios ◽  
Local Climate ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation

This study evaluates the pattern of a nighttime climate index namely the tropical nights (Tmin ≥ 20ºC) during the 21st century in several different sized cities in the Carpathian Basin. For the modelling, MUKLIMO_3 microclimatic model and the cuboid statistical method were applied. In order to ensure the proper representation of the thermal characteristics of an urban landscape, the Local Climate Zone (LCZ) system was used as landuse information. For this work, LCZ maps were produced using WUDAPT methodology. The climatic input of the model was the Carpatclim dataset for the reference period (1981–2010) and EURO-CORDEX regional model outputs for the future time periods (2021–2050, 2071–2100) and emission scenarios (RCP4.5, RCP8.5). As results show, there would be a remarkable increase in the number of tropical nights along the century, and there is a clearly recognizable increase owing to urban landform. In the near past, the number of the index was 6–10 nights higher in the city core than the rural area where the number of this index was negligible. In the near future this urban-rural trend is the same, however, there is a slight increase (2–5 nights) in the index in city cores. At the end of the century, the results of the two emission scenarios become distinct. In the case of RCP4.5 the urban values are about 15–25 nights, what is less stressful compared to the 30–50 nights according to RCP8.5. The results clearly highlight that the effect of urban climate and climate change would cause serious risk for urban dwellers, therefore it is crucial to perform climate mitigation and adaptation actions on both global and urban scales.

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