The nexus of ‘urban resilience’ and ‘energy efficiency’ in cities
Sesil Koutra, Mireilla Balsells Mondejar, Vincent Becue
Abstract
In the realm of major continuous challenges cities are key leverage points in the quest for global sustainability due to their high consumptions and waste and contain hotspots of vulnerability. Their exposure to increasing environmental, economic, health, societal or other risks make them susceptible to continuous threats with uncertain impacts. In face of these hazards, the increasing use of the connotation of ‘urban resilience’ in worldwide commitments and discourses is a promising approach to increase efficiency and stretch for integrated solutions. Despite its importance, the nexus of the concepts is yet not unveiled in the existing literature. In this work and in an attempt to interconnect the terms, this study provides an insight to the emerging concept of the urban resilience to represent the city durability and to mutualize it with the complexity of the ‘green’ energy transition. This study reveals the major limitations in the inadequacy of interchangeable approaches of climate change adaptation in designing strategies of Energy Efficiency to satisfactorily address plausible chocs. Using a dynamic perspective, this manuscript draws upon a range of emerging literature on climate change actions and resilient strategies in selected case studies. The paper concludes with suggesting complex matrixes addressing the energy shortage and analyze the intricate issues for resilient and safe strategies. Further research, knowhow sharing and experiences to quantify the benefits of these strategies but also exploring the cooperation and governance models are prioritized for forthcoming studies of the topic.