From Problems to Potentials - The Urban Energy Transition of Gruž, Dubrovnik

In the challenge for a sustainable society, carbon-neutrality is the critical objective for all cities in the coming decades. In the EU City-zen project, academic partners collaborate to develop an urban energy transition methodology, which supports cities in making the energy transition to sustainable lifestyles and carbon neutrality. As part of the project, so-called Roadshows are organised in cities that wish to take the first step toward zero-energy living. Each Roadshow being methodologically composed to allow sustainability experts from across Europe to co-create designs, strategies and timelines with local stakeholders in order to reach this vital goal. Following a precursory investigative student workshop (the SWAT Studio) Dubrovnik would be third city to host the Roadshow in November 2016. During these events the characteristics of Dubrovnik, and the district of Gruž in particular, were systematically analysed, leading to good insights into the current problems and potentials of the city. In close collaboration with local stakeholders, the team proposed a series of interventions that would help make Gruž, and in its wake the whole city of Dubrovnik, net zero energy and zero carbon, by validation of carbon emission calculations. The vision presented to the inhabitants and its key city decision makers encompassed a pathway towards an attainable sustainable future. The strategies and solutions proposed for the Dubrovnik district of Gruž turned out to be capable of reducing the current carbon sequestration compensation of 1,200 hectares of forestland to 67 hectares only, an area achievable by urban reforestation projects. This paper presents the City-zen methodology of urban energy transition and that of the City-zen Roadshow, the analysis of the city of Dubrovnik, proposed interventions and the carbon impact, as calculated by means of a carbon accounting method discussed in the paper

Future city visions - The energy transition towards carbon-neutrality – Lessons learned from the case of roeselare, Belgium

As climate change develops, with most of the world population living in urban areas, decarbonisation of cities is among the greatest challenges of the coming decades. In the framework of the EU City-zen project, a number of so-called Roadshows has been organised in ten cities within and outside Europe in order to plan and kick-off their transition towards an energy- and climate-neutral economy. During the Roadshows, a group of experts is engaged to perform co-working activities and participative labs involving local stakeholders. These activities support cities in identifying their own decarbonisation pathways, mainly by combining three mutual processes, i.e. energy design, urban design and carbon accounting. The latter, in particular, has been used to quantify the greenhouse gas emissions of cities and neighbourhoods and to estimate the mitigation effect of a combination of measures towards the desirable condition of carbon neutrality. This exploratory and proactive design process has been successfully demonstrated through intensive workshops and can be potentially replicated in other cities. This paper provides a schematic overview of the main results achieved in the Belgian town of Roeselare, but more significantly it describes the techniques needed to make that cooperative process understandable, impactful and implementable. It is likely that 2050 European goals will drastically change urban environments and socio-economic dynamics in cities, due to the fragmentation of energy sources. Hence, from this standpoint there is a vital need for integrated technologies and infrastructures, a circular economy and community-based processes such as food production, sharing of facilities and valorisation of ecosystem services. The City-zen Roeselare Roadshow brought over 300 stakeholders into the process of re-imagining and visualising their 2050 future city with these solutions. Stakeholders, with no particular expertise in carbon accounting or sustainability, would now have the capability of understanding and applying these solutions in a combined effort to meet the zero-carbon challenge. The approach is generally replicable elsewhere being highly visual, impactful, transferable, and multi-stakeholder friendly. Given that data are made locally available, the combination of this general approach, site-specific assessments and the involvement of both experts and local stakeholders (i.e. policy makers, citizens, etc) allow the transition to start by referring to any real city or neighbourhood