This report, City-Level Decoupling: Urban resource flows and the governance of infrastructure transitions applies the International Resource Panel report, Decoupling Resource Use and Environmental Impacts from Economic Growth to cities. The core argument of the Decoupling Report was that a transition to a green economy will depend on finding ways to sustain economic growth rates without escalating rates of resource use. To achieve this decoupling, appropriate sustainability-oriented innovation will need to be initiated, promoted and applied on a large scale. The report discusses some emerging trends within cities that demonstrate that it is possible to decouple urban development and rising rates of resource consumption, in other words, resource decoupling.
While the topic of sustainability within cities is currently attracting a large amount of attention, this report examines the issue from a new angle – addressing the key role of infrastructure in directing material flows and therefore resource use, productivity and efficiency in an urban context. In doing so, it makes the case for examining cities from a material flow perspective, presenting the city as a living organism with a dynamic and continuous flow of inputs and outputs as its “metabolism”, while also placing the city within the broader system of flows that make it possible for it to function.
The report highlights the way that the design, construction and operation of infrastructures, such as for energy, waste, water, sanitation and transport, create a socio-technical environment that shapes the “way of life” of citizens and how they procure, use and dispose of the resources they require. Its approach is innovative in that it frames infrastructure networks as socio-technical systems, examining pressures for change within cities that go beyond technical considerations. The importance of intermediaries as the dominant agents for change is emphasized, as well as the fact that social processes and dynamics need to be understood and integrated into any assessment of urban infrastructure interventions. Innovations in and of themselves do not suffice if they are not integrated into larger strategic visions for the city. A set of 30 case studies provide examples of innovative approaches to sustainable infrastructure change across a broad range of urban contexts that could inspire leaders of other cities to embrace similar creative solutions. Of course, each city is unique, and interventions need to be tailored to set the challenges and opportunities present in each case. The Panel’s Working Group on Cities will continue to explore the theme, addressing some of these issues in more detail.