21st Century Clusters for transformative solutions/ LCL: Beyond carbon

This week the phase two of the low-carbon leaders project was presented at the UNGC annual meeting in Copenhagen. It was a great session and from an idea less than a year ago to a fully operational project with significant support for a transformative agenda it is a project with the potential to help set the agenda at Rio+20.

The leaflet describing the project can be found here.

Launch of RiREL in Taiwan

The 0.9 version of RiREL was launched in Taiwan 15th of May.

The parts I worked on are in the PPT that can be found here.

Suzanne Pahlman did the presentation.

Postdoc position for Low Carbon City Development Index (LCCDI)

Thanks to Steen Rasmussen, Professor and Center Director at University of Southern Denmark, someone will be given the historic opportunity to do a postdoc in the area of a low-carbon city development index (LCCDI). This work will focus on the full impact, positive and negative, including the impact beyond the borders of the city through import/export of embedded energy, as well as export of low-carbon solutions that help other parts of the world reduce their emissions.

See below for more information:

Project: Low Carbon City Index (LCCDI) [1]

Cities are realizing the urgency to confront the climate challenge. New ideas and innovations are being developed and implemented by cities everywhere. However, many roadblocks slow down the exchange of promising ideas and innovations among cities.

The Low Carbon City Dynamic Index grew out of an urgency to define a universal science-based measure for the CO₂ balance in cities[2]. An operational and science-based index is highly desirable as a means of tracking the true CO₂ emissions in a given region as well as a base for comparison and benchmarking between different cities. It is envisioned that the LCCDI could define a much-needed international standard.

As cities will increasingly house a greater fraction of the global population cities must also be part of the solution to the CO₂ emission problem. Therefore the LCCDI is divided into five parts where three parts are focused on CO₂ reduction solutions:

The index focus on solutions and will have five parts:

1. Urban profile (land use and actual carbon profile)

2. Urban trajectory (actual carbon history)

3. Investments for the future (high- or low-carbon investments)

4. Actual export of solutions (high- or low-carbon contribution/technology to the world)

5. Policy support/engagement (high- or low-carbon policy promotion)

Note that the CO₂ accounting includes imports and exports. E.g. CO₂ emissions from the production of goods produced elsewhere, but consumed in the city, are accounted for within the city.

The development of the index will follow a three-step plan.

Step 1: Compiling the index on a small group of 3-5 cities including: Sønderborg Denmark, London GB, Baoding China, utilizing (incomplete) database and established stakeholder network/contacts.

Step 2: Preparing a scientific paper on the index, linking up with additional key stakeholders, incl. progressive cities and related scientific and NGO index working groups, as well as graphical presentation material for stakeholder engagement.

Step 3: Institutionalization of the index (e.g. World Bank, Nordic Countries, WWF).

Budget:

Initiative for Science, Society and Policy could cover ~50% of a 1-year postdoc (or 100% for ~half a year postdoc) with a starting date ASAP. The academic task of the postdoc is to complete the practical implementation of the LCCI as outlined above through steps 1 and 2.

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[1] Point of contact: Steen Rasmussen, Professor & Center Director, Fundamental Living Technology, SDU, http://www.sdu.dk/flint & Science Board, Initiative for Science, Society and Policy (ISSP), http://www.science-society-policy.org. The project will also be part of the NORTH STAR network, headed by Professor Mike Goodsite, see http://www.nord-star.info. Mike is also Science Board member at ISSP.

[2] LCCI originates in the ‘Copenhagen Declaration’, which was formulated in mid-2008 by stakeholders committed to helping cities improve their carbon performance. For a complete list of participants, see: John Bang (World Wildlife Foundation, Denmark) and Peter Rathje (ProjectZero, Denmark) “Low Carbon City Index, Concept Note”, Draft June 4, 2009, which has an implementation plan. The LCCI concept was further elaborated by Diana Mangalagiu (Reims Business School, France) and Britta Boyd (University of Southern Denmark), “Development of a Low Carbon City Index: the Issue of Accounting for Import/Export Emissions”, 2009 International Energy Workshop, Venice, Italy June 17th - 19th, 2009. The current form of the Index is mainly taken from Dennis Pamlin et al., (http://www.pamlin.net and http://lowcarbondeelopmentindex.net) where further inclusion of CO₂ policies and solutions are introduced into the LCCI and is now called Low Carbon City Dynamics Index (LCCDI).