{"id":383,"date":"2019-05-19T20:09:33","date_gmt":"2019-05-19T19:09:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theoneplanetlife.com\/?p=383"},"modified":"2020-01-20T16:09:32","modified_gmt":"2020-01-20T16:09:32","slug":"how-cities-can-adopt-the-one-planet-city-framework","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/theoneplanetlife.com\/cy\/how-cities-can-adopt-the-one-planet-city-framework\/","title":{"rendered":"How cities can adopt the ‘One Planet’ City framework"},"content":{"rendered":"

How can the essential needs of the growing human population be met without breaking the Earth\u2019s already-stretched life-support system? This is the question I set myself to answer with my new book, ‘One Planet’ Cities: Sustaining Humanity within Planetary Limits<\/a><\/u>.<\/p>\n

\"Cover<\/a><\/p>\n

It is linked to my new campaign for cities to declare an ambition to reduce their ecological footprint<\/a><\/u>, beginning in Wales, as a response to the twinned climate and extinction emergencies, which I am running with the Global Footprint Network.<\/p>\n

It is also a key textbook for a new postgraduate certificate in #OnePlanet Governance<\/a><\/u> at the University of Wales Trinity St David, that civil servants and other students can take as distance learning from anywhere in the world, and gain CPD points. I want to train the next generation of civic leaders in how to save the world.<\/p>\n

Although I started my work before Kate Raworth\u2019s Doughnut Economics came out, it builds on it and the work of the Global Footprint Network, whose president, Matthis Wackernagel, was extremely helpful during its writing.<\/p>\n

It is based on interviews with a great many urban leaders around the world and webinars with them that I have conducted during my time as curator of the sustainable cities collective web forum, as well as much supplementary research.<\/p>\n

It’s also a follow-up to my previous book The One Planet Life<\/a><\/u>, which is a manual for what individuals and households can do to reduce their ecological footprint and live lightly on the earth. At the end of that book there are twenty case studies, the last ones being set in cities.<\/p>\n

Contraction and convergence<\/h2>\n

Four out of five people are predicted to be urban dwellers by 2080. No country or city in the world now meets the needs of its citizens In a truly sustainable fashion (within Raworth’s doughnut).<\/p>\n

\u2018One Planet\u2019 Cities proposes a pathway to this genuine sustainability for cities and neighborhoods, using an approach based on \u2018contraction and convergence\u2019.<\/p>\n

The new book examines all aspects of modern society from food provision to neighbourhood design, via industry, the circular economy, energy and transport through the critical lens of the ecological footprint and relevant supporting international standards and indicators.<\/p>\n

There are recommendations on managing supply chains and impacts, how the transition to a world within limits might be financed, and a deep examination of the Welsh Government\u2019s pioneering efforts follow.<\/p>\n

It discusses how the dystopic stories we tell ourselves about the future can influence the future we make and concludes with an imagined vision of what a genuinely sustainable future might be like, based on the examples in the book, and an appeal for \u2018one planeteers\u2019 everywhere to step up to the challenge.<\/p>\n

What would setting a target to be a ‘one planet’ city mean?<\/h3>\n

It means adopting a framework for working over time so that all activities over which a city has power & influence combine together to reduce its ecological footprint (which includes carbon and biocapacity) to a measurably sustainable level. The time period is defined. The main tools are shifts in collective awareness and in the way all money is spent. The objective is to address the combined climate, resource and extinction emergencies at the same time with win-win-win solutions to create a flagship healthy, successful and resilient city.<\/p>\n

The 6-step path towards One Planet a city<\/h3>\n

1. Obtain community buy-in and awareness-raising.
\n2. Decide which standards and goals to use.
\n3. Determine the baseline \u2013 the current situation of biocapacity and resource use.
\n4. Set targets to ratchet down consumption and boost biocapacity for each sector over realistic timescales (e.g. 5-year intervals up to 2030 then 2050).
\n5. Set in place ways to measure them.
\n6. Keep checking and refining.<\/p>\n

The basic \u2018One Planet\u2019 a city requirements<\/h3>\n
    \n
  1. \n

    An aim to reduce the ecological footprint to ‘one planet’ by (say, 2050) would become an underlying principle of all planning and policy as a verifiable regenerative strategy.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  2. \n

    That the same set of social and environmental criteria should be used to assess all planning applications and procurements (i.e. a reduction of ecological footprint and increase in biocapacity, step-changing incrementally over time to the level currently applied to One Planet Developments<\/a> in the open countryside\u00a0 in Wales under TAN6<\/a>).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  3. \n

    The criteria should be informed by appropriate indicators including lifecycle and ecological footprint analysis, using the simple NPV+ tool which allows you to compare all potential and actual projects for their impacts and benefits.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  4. \n

    Official policy would support all areas and sectors to become more productive and more biodiverse \u2013 regenerative. E.g. supporting more food growing in the city.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  5. \n

    Reduction of excessive consumption by a shift to a closed loop economy using procurement tools and believing that meeting basic needs is sufficient for everybody.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Sut byddai cyrff gwario yn mynd ati<\/h3>\n

    Every project initiated by public bodies would be evaluated relative to the overall goal as follows:<\/p>\n