Utilities, a key to achieving the net-zero carbon cities of the future

Cities are currently responsible for over 70 percent of the world’s carbon emissions[1]; therefore, cities are at the forefront of the global movement to achieving net zero emissions. Urban areas will play the most important role in tackling the effects of climate change, as the population living in cities has been forecast to double by 2050[2] to 7 out of 10 people worldwide. Additionally, cities contribute over 80 percent of the global GDP. Demand on utilities in cities is constantly increasing due to factors such as the rise in population, electric vehicles requiring extensive EV charging rollout, and telecoms upgrades to 5G networks becoming economically imperative.

The effective rollout and upgrading of utilities are essential in future-proofing cities against huge population growth while achieving a carbon-neutral, or even carbon-positive, status. City populations face some of the greatest risks of climate change due to their density and reliance on privately-managed infrastructure. To create cities that can withstand the years to come, we need to innovate the utility sector to become part of the solution and not the problem.

Balancing Policy with Infrastructure

Decarbonizing cities around the world will need a coordinated approach between urban planners and infrastructure developers, including utilities such as energy, telecoms, waste, and water. The challenges of network planning will only get greater in the decades ahead.

Policy-makers need to work alongside utility providers in a public-private sector collaboration to create a coordinated planning approach that is fit for purpose. The currently common process of energy providers identifying local demand, then building networks working in conjunction with planners and developers is not adequate to achieve net zero cities. Utilities need to be coordinated across the board to meet future demand against different outcomes and risks relating to the global economy, climate change, and other geopolitical challenges. 

Utility companies must lobby city policy-makers if the green agenda isn’t at the forefront of decision-making and investment.

The Opportunity for Net-Zero Cities

Because cities have usually been developed for decades, especially in central zones, there is a huge challenge for utility companies in upgrading or expanding their infrastructure sensitively and sustainably. There are huge development constraints within urban areas, not to mention a lack of space. Therefore, there are big opportunities in cities for optimising investment in technology that will smooth upgrade builds and allow companies to consider collaboration.

Using AI simulators to forecast future demand for utilities dependent on different scenarios (population growth; climate impact; technological advances), for example, gives decision-makers essential data that can be used to plan and support net-zero targets. The kind of information scenario simulations provide should be shared collaboratively with local governments and planners as well as other utility providers to achieve the best outcomes. By working together, inefficient infrastructure or outstretched networks can be predicted and place-based solutions created to avoid such outcomes.

Achieving net zero in cities will also require utility companies to invest in their workforce, providing resources for upskilling, retraining, and focusing on employee retention and redeployment. Without the right people with the right skills in place, cities will struggle to build and manage the utility infrastructure needed to achieve a net zero status. The economic opportunities of working towards net zero are vast.

Making full use of the local supply chain within cities is another way utility companies can support urban economies while lowering carbon footprints associated with bringing in suppliers from outside the immediate area. Although this of course won’t be possible in all cases, working towards a circular economy within city utilities is crucial to achieving net zero emissions, plus supports the communities directly affected by build programs.

Capitalising on Community Engagement

To create net zero cities, utilities need to invest in ways for communities to control their usage to encourage efficiency within their sectors. Alongside upgrading networks and channels, reducing energy usage is key to decarbonisation, but urban residents must be supported, educated, and engaged during the transition toward sustainable living for it to work. Initiatives such as community-owned renewable projects (most likely solar developments), green roofs, or retrofitting buildings will all require local support to achieve planning consent and produce the greatest results in carbon reductions.

Utilities need to plan carefully to achieve universal access across cities to meet community needs while encouraging efficiencies both within their networks and at the end-user level. Allowing communities to monitor and control their utility usage in real-time, for example through next-generation smart meters, is one obvious tactic. Producing the necessary technology and making it fitted-as-standard requires both investment from utility companies themselves as well as local leaders.

In turn, collecting local feedback and data from city populations is crucial in informing future infrastructure decisions, as well as identifying times of high demand or areas that require improvement.

An Integrated Approach

A report by the World Economic Forum in January 2021[3] proposed a digitalised, integrated approach as the solution to achieving net zero cities.

An integrated approach means the electrification of cities, a switch to renewable energy resources, using digitization to optimise energy usage, and decarbonizing heating and cooling systems.

This includes creating a circular economy for water and other utilities where possible, including carbon capture. For example, decarbonisation of heating and cooling through the creation of heating systems fed by excess heat generated from industrial processes or implementing cooling processes using wastewater. Existing resources within cities can be adapted while new systems are developed and rolled out.

One of the major challenges ahead for net zero cities is that most utility companies themselves are not yet carbon-neutral. 16 out of the world’s 30 largest utility companies do not expect to be fossil-free until 2050[4]. It’s one thing to work towards creating net zero cities, but the achievement feels undermined when the utilities behind it are still far from carbon-neutral themselves.

The Road to Net Zero

As the biggest consumers of resources and the largest carbon emitters, cities are key to achieving a global net zero. As our population becomes more and more urban, there is a huge role for utilities to play to meet decarbonisation targets, which includes working alongside planners and decision-makers, integrating with other sectors, engaging with people living in cities, and using technology to its full advantage.

Footnotes:

[1] https://netzerocities.eu/

[2]https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/urbandevelopment/overview#:~:text=Today%2C%20some%2056%25%20of%20the,people%20will%20live%20in%20cities

[3] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Net_Zero_Carbon_Cities_An_Integrated_Approach_2021.pdf

[4] https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights/latest-news-headlines/path-to-net-zero-utility-execs-insist-we-can-69901885