Role of Energy in Sustainable Urban Development Planning

摘要

For the first time in human history, more than half the world's population lives in urban areas. Around the world, mega and super cities with tens of millions of inhabitants are rapidly expanding. In the UK, over 80% of the population already lives in urban areas, and the country is going through a new phase of urban development and regeneration that will affect the way we live for decades to come. There has been a renewed interest in urban planning throughout the cities due to increasing proportions of their population, production, and consumption become concentrated in urban areas. This has resulted in need for urban development patterns that are more sustainable from the point of view of energy and environment rather than to increase economic competition between cities. During the course of literature survey it has been observed that the world has seen an uncontrollable pace of urbanisation, and a consequent rise in energy demand for private and public consumption and for economic activities - leading on to greater emission of GHGs. This has led to an urgent need for the incorporation of energy sustainability issues to be included in urban planning. Today's cities faces deep challenges to achieving sustainability due their linkage to global markets for their energy, food, raw materials, consumer goods, and economic output, and these long-distance transactions generate significant GHG emissions. Cities pull resources from outside in far greater quantities than are available within their own geographic areas and generate waste streams that exceed their own carrying capacities. The main aim of this paper is to review the scale and nature of urban planning development worldwide with specific reference to UK cities for meeting sustainable development goals. It has been observed that strategic land use plans during the 1990s have often been seen as tools to implement particular visions for the future of cities and linked to an economic change. Therefore, it has been argued that the urban planning in cities throughout the world is more oriented towards promoting the city's competitive advantage than achieving energy sustainability in it. The paper focuses on this aspect of urban planning process, in turn explores the way in which the renewed interest in strategic planning has to be stimulated by this competitive attitude. The paper highlights that there is need for greater awareness, and increase energy efficiency, and thrust towards appropriate energy efficient or environment friendly renewable energy technologies. Finally, the paper takes the view that this revival of strategic thinking is required to achieve the energy sustainability and in turn need for protection of environment by widening the role of renewable energy in urban planning.