White Paper: Building truly sustainable cities

Sustainability touches all areas of human life – from land and sea to health and wellbeing, from the buildings we live and work in to how we get from A to B, and from what we eat and consume to how we produce goods and procure them. It is also inextricably linked to the battle against climate change and reducing carbon emissions. For cities in particular, sustainability is fast becoming the watchword guiding a range of strategies and initiatives across all municipal departments.

There are no shortage of targets and frameworks to guide sustainability strategies, chiefly the Paris Agreement and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Reducing emissions in areas like the built environment is crucial to achieving such goals and cities know they sit on the front line of the action. They have a window of opportunity to work with their ecosystem of technology partners, system integrators, consultants and other stakeholders to build more sustainable indoor and outdoor environments.

Energy efficiency – using less energy to perform the same task – must be key to sustainability strategies and can enable a reduction-first clean energy transition, delivering benefits in far shorter timeframes than other approaches. This white paper, in association with global lighting leader Signify, aims to provide targeted and actionable advice to helping cities accelerate their low-carbon plans and become truly sustainable.

This white paper covers:

• The scale of the decarbonisation challenge faced by cities.
• How cities can use connected technologies to create greener buildings and the vital role of retrofitting
• Detailed analysis of the energy- and cost-savings that energy efficiency programmes can bring in cities.
• Why connected LED lighting is one of the most powerful decarbonisation tools
• How the City of Mesa in Arizona worked with Signify to become more sustainable 
• The human side of sustainability and why it is vital for healthier lives and improving quality of life
• What funding options and technology options are available.

In association with