We can’t beat the climate crisis without rethinking landuse.
A wonderful article from the Brookings Institute came across our screens recently. It discusses US GHG goals and the approaches that we most frequently discuss, such as decarbonizing electricity (insufficient). What it decarbonizing electricity does not do, however, is solve the problems created by sprawl.
Real estate is designed to accommodate the automobile. Even if all of the vehicles are running on clean energy, the sprawl model still requires huge amounts of infrastructure to support the model, all of which has its own emissions in the maintenance of the model. Building materials, concrete, asphalt, piping etc. All of that material further stresses under increased temperatures.
See the link below. We have printed it out and are reading every sentence. If you want to know more about what kind of communities they are describing as the solution, read more on our website, and consider signing up to our newsletter. The Nature Towns model was designed using the same data set (CoolClimate Network) that was used in this report.
“That leaves the country with no choice. We must prioritize development in the kinds of neighborhoods that permanently reduce total driving and consume less energy.”
