Towards a More-than-Human Approach to Smart and Sustainable Urban Development: Designing for Multispecies Justice

The term ‘sustainability’ has become an overused umbrella term that encompasses a range of climate actions and environmental infrastructure investments; however, there is still an urgent need for transformative reform work. Scholars of urban studies have made compelling cases for a more-than-human conceptualisation of urban and environmental planning and also share a common interest in translating theory into practical approaches and implications that recognise (i) our ecological entanglements with planetary systems and (ii) the urgent need for multispecies justice in the reconceptualisation of genuinely sustainable cities. More-than-human sensibility draws on a range of disciplines and encompasses conventional and non-conventional research methods and design approaches. In this article, we offer a horizon scan type of review of key posthuman and more-than-human literature sources at the intersection of urban studies and environmental humanities. The aim of this review is to (i) contribute to the emerging discourse that is starting to operationalise a more-than-human approach to smart and sustainable urban development, and; (ii) to articulate a nascent framework for more-than-human spatial planning policy and practice.

Backward Trajectory and Multifractal Analysis of Air Pollution in Zhengzhou Region of China

With the continuous promotion of industrialization and urbanization, China's environmental pollution is becoming increasingly serious, which has caused considerable damage to the natural balance. Air pollution seriously harms people's physical and mental health, the ecological environment, and the social sustainable development of society. In this study, the backward trajectory model and multifractal methods were adopted to analyze air pollution in Zhengzhou. The backward trajectory analysis showed that most clusters of air pollution were from southern Hebei, eastern Shandong, and mid-western Henan, which were then transported to Zhengzhou. For the PSCF and CWT analyses, we selected four representative cities to explore how close the air pollution of Zhengzhou is to other areas on the basis of air polluted concentration. The results of several multifractal methods indicated that multifractality existed in the AQI time series of Zhengzhou and cross-correlations between Zhengzhou and each of the four cities. The widths of multifractal spectra showed that the air pollution in Zhengzhou was closest to that in Jinan, followed by Shijiazhuang, Zibo, and Luoyang. The CDFA analysis showed that carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and inhalable particulate matter (PM10) had important influences on air pollution in Zhengzhou. These findings offer a useful reference for air pollution sources and their potential contributions in Zhengzhou, which can support policy makers in environmental governance and in achieving sustainable urban development.

CO2 Emissions and The Transport Sector in Malaysia

Transport is an essential infrastructure for development. With its high share of gross domestic product (GDP), it makes a significant contribution to total CO2 emissions in Malaysia. It is therefore important to pay greater attention to reducing CO2 emissions and sustainable development in this sector. Therefore, this study aims at estimating the relationship between transport CO2 emissions and its key drivers using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) technique. The time period covered by the study extends from 1978 to 2018. It further investigates the response of CO2 emissions to shocks in the value of other variables by employing the generalized impulse response approach. The results suggest that urbanization is the major contributor to the increase in CO2 emissions followed by the carbon intensity of energy in the long-run. Carbon intensity of energy, GDP per transport worker and urbanization contribute significantly to increases in transport CO2 emissions in the short- and long-run. Testing the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis recommends that Malaysia continue to be on track to reach the highest level of income and welfare to give pay more attention to the environment. Therefore, the country maintains its CO2 emissions level in the future because of economic development. Therefore, these findings show that energy and environmental policymakers need to pay more attention to improving energy efficiency and the use of low-carbon technologies and electrification in the transport sector and the use of high-quality public transport, particularly in urban areas, for sustainable urban development.

Advances on Smart Cities and Smart Buildings

Modern cities are facing the challenge of combining competitiveness on a global city scale and sustainable urban development to become smart cities [...]

Spatiotemporal Dynamics of Ecological Security Pattern of Urban Agglomerations in Yangtze River Delta Based on LUCC Simulation

Urbanization has not only promoted economic development, but also significantly changed land use and development strategy. The environmental problems brought by urbanization threaten ecological security directly. Therefore, it is necessary to introduce changes in land use when constructing an ecological security pattern. This study takes the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration, one of the most economically developed regions in China, as the research area. Based on its land use status, the Cellular Automata–Markov model was used to predict the quantitative change and transfer of land-use types in 2025, and three types of land-use patterns were simulated under different scenarios. Combined with the pressure–state–response model, the Entropy TOPSIS comprehensive evaluation model is used to evaluate the three phases in the years of 2005, 2010, and 2015, and the results indicated that the safety level dropped from 85.45% to 82.94%. Five spatial associations were obtained from the spatial autocorrelation analysis using GeoDA, and the clustering distribution of the three phases was roughly the same. Based on the requirements of “Natural Growth” scenario, “Urban Sprawl” scenario, and “Ecological Protection” scenario, the transfer matrix of the various land-use types were modified rationally. The results of scenario simulations illustrated that the level of urbanization was inversely proportional to the level of ecological security. The surrounding cities in the northern part of Taihu Lake were developing rapidly, with low levels of ecological security. The hilly cities in the southern part, in contrast, developed slowly and had a high level of ecological security. Based on the temporal and spatial changes in the ecosystem, an ecosystem optimization model was proposed to determine the ecological functional areas. The nature of each functional area provided the basis to formulate urban construction and management plans and achieve sustainable urban development.

Exploring the Spatiotemporal Evolution and Sustainable Driving Factors of Information Flow Network: A Public Search Attention Perspective

The promotion of information flow reinforces the interactive cooperation and evolutionary process among cities. In the information age, public online search is a typical behavior of Internet society, which is the key to information flow generation and agglomeration. In this study, we attempt to explore the evolutionary characteristics of intercity networks driven by public online social behavior in the information age and construct an information flow network (IFN) from the perspective of public search attention. We also explore the evolution of the IFN in terms of the whole network, node hierarchy, and subgroup aggregation. Meanwhile, we also discuss the impact of the sustainable driving factors on the IFN. Finally, an empirical study was conducted in Guanzhong Plain Urban Agglomeration (GPUA). Our results show that: (1) the information flow in GPUA fluctuating upward in the early study period and gradually decreasing in the later study period. However, the agglomeration degree of information flow in the urban agglomeration continues to increase. (2) The hierarchical structure of urban nodes in GPUA presents a trend of “high in the middle and low on both sides”, and the formation of subgroups is closely related to geographic location. (3) The driving factors all impacting the IFN include public ecology, resource investment, information infrastructure, and economic foundation. This study provides theoretical and practical support for exploring the intercity network and promotes the sustainable urban development.

Dubai, the sustainable, smart city

Over the years, Dubai − UAE has achieved undoubtedly fascinating development in city styles and construction. The desert has been transferred to an advanced modern city with the tallest buildings in a considerable time. It has always encouraged achieving healthy and sustainable development in all sectors, explicitly building construction. It has and still working towards maintaining the balance between socio-economic development and environmental protection. It has been announced and put within the national vision that it is of priority for the Government to transform Dubai into a smart city with an eco-friendly economy. This is under the aim to make it the most sustainable city in the world by 2021. The other Emirates are also trying to build their own fully sustainable cities. A sustainable plan is “a building that reduces its environmental impact by decreasing energy and water use and reducing the waste production. Dubai's Green Building Regulations and Specifications encourage all contractors to build toward an eco-friendlier tomorrow, maintaining the future cohorts without negatively impacting the resident's health. It covers a wide range of topics related to green building design, including ecology planning, building vitality, resource efficiency in energy, water, materials, and waste management. Dubai has made the environment a part of its overall strategic plan, including many sub-plans, initiatives, and projects to improve the emirate's environmental conditions and reduce energy use. Dubai's strategic plan to become a green metropolis includes green buildings and green building materials. The difficulties that sustainable urban development presents are considerable. They are working on various techniques to lead today's urbanisation toward sustainability, including urban planning, transportation infrastructure, quality of life, and renewable energy use, to name a few. Green construction and green towns are part of a long-term national drive in the UAE to promote a green economy with the tagline “A green economy for sustainable development”. This paper is highlighting the advanced initiatives, technologies, materials, strategies, difficulties and challenges that Dubai has been through to achieve sustainable smart city goals.