Eurbanlab: Accelerating urban innovations

Today, over half of the world’s population lives in cities. Given the effects of climate change and other environmental challenges for cities, the need for change is high. Eurbanlab has developed a framework to guide cities to sustainability through systemic urban innovations. The challenge is to accelerate innovation cycles in cities and overcome a general reluctance to invest in innovative and systemic projects. Eurbanlab proves through its assessments which innovations are ready to be widely implemented and understands what process to use to accelerate the achievement of increasingly sustainable results.

It is estimated that cities account for at least 70% of global carbon emissions. Buildings and transport are the largest contributors of emissions, causing as much as 40% and 30% respectively. Existing buildings tend to be inefficient in the energy usage. Knocking these buildings down to make way for new ones is expensive and means losing certain cultural and social value. Retrofitting of complete building stocks and an implementation of energy efficiency measures in new buildings is necessary. Similarly, transport and mobility systems in cities need to be (re)designed, in that innovative efficiency solutions are integrated. Hence, in order to overcome the impacts of climate change there is a need for a systemic approach to urban innovation which encompasses all urban sustainability dimensions.