Looking for a New Order in Urban Energy Efficient Strategies in Urban Studies

Looking for a New Order in Urban Energy Efficient Strategies in Urban Studies

More than 50% of the global population already lives in urban settlements which are projected to absorb almost all the global population growth to 2050, amounting to some additional three billion people. Over the next decades the increase in rural population in many developing countries will be overshadowed by population flows to cities. Rural populations globally are expected to peak at a level of 3.5 billion people by around 2020 and decline thereafter. Given the robust trends toward a convergence of much of the developing world to levels of urbanization already found in the developed world, the energy and sustainability challenges of equitable access to clean-energy services, of energy security, and of environmental compatibility at local through global scales cannot be addressed without explicit consideration of urban energy systems and their specific sustainability challenges and opportunities. Energy-wise, the world is already predominantly urban. It is estimated that between 60–80% of final energy use globally is urban. Hereby various urban elements play significant role in urban energy consumption rate. Knowing these key drivers and providing appropriate strategies may be an important action toward a more efficient urban future. Considering the aforementioned challenges, acquiring a comprehensive view on key drivers and therefore comprehensive urban energy efficiency strategies is the fundamental aim of the present research. Based on this aim, a wide literature review on global urban energy issues is done to provide comprehensive knowledge of the most important urban energy key drivers. In the next step, a comprehensive urban energy efficiency strategies is delivered in different urban dimensions.