Making the case for the nexus between resilience and resource efficiency at the city scale

ABSTRACT

Global challenges such as climate change, resource scarcity and poverty must increasingly be tackled in cities. While cities can be significant contributors to climate change and resource scarcity, and face considerable risks as a consequence of these, they are also central to the solutions for these challenges. The quality of infrastructure, reliability of service provision and other economic and political conditions in urban areas shape levels of resource use by, and exposure to risks for, residents. This paper – which introduces a special issue on resilience and resource efficiency at the city scale – introduces these two concepts and explores the nexus between them. It uses several case studies from different contexts to illustrate the relationship between these ideas, and describes how the papers in the issue engage with them. 

KEYWORDS:

• Resilience
• resource efficiency
• cities
• sustainability
• nexus

Introduction – cities, resilience and resource efficiency

For the first time in human history, the majority of the Earth’s population lives in urban areas, which are expected to grow by a further 2.5 billion people by 2050 (UN-DESA 2014). The unprecedented number and proportion of people living in towns and cities has significant implications for planning and decision-making. Among other things, it means that global challenges such as climate change, resource scarcity and poverty must increasingly be tackled in cities. These are some of the key issues explored in this special issue, which draws on a range of case studies and approaches to assess the ways in which integrated approaches to resilience and resource efficiency can provide entry points to address these significant challenges.

Urban areas can be centres of vulnerability due to the high density of people and economic activity. This vulnerability is compounded when towns and cities are located in sites with high exposure to hazards (such as coastal and riverine systems) or have high susceptibility to harm (such as large populations of low-income and other marginalised groups). Globally, urbanisation is largely happening in areas with limited economic and institutional capacity (Elmqvist et al. 2013), while within urban areas, low-income and other marginalised groups are particularly likely to live in hazardous physical environments (Dodman and Satterthwaite 2008). Climate change will exacerbate these existing risks and create new ones, such as heatwaves, sea-level rise, storm surges and more frequent and intense droughts and floods (IPCC 2014).

Increasing levels of human consumption – including by growing and increasingly wealthy urban populations – are also depleting important resource stocks, such as fresh water and fisheries. Meanwhile, waste and pollution are causing negative environmental impacts such as climate change, biodiversity loss and ocean acidification. The growth in consumption is partially driven by global population growth, but more substantially by individuals and societies becoming more affluent (Steinberger et al. 2010; Weinzettel et al. 2013). Already, unsustainable levels of resource use and waste production have caused humanity to exceed safe levels of change to the climate, land-systems, genetic diversity and the phosphorous and nitrogen cycles (Röckstrom et al. 2009; Steffen et al. 2015). Resource efficiency measures are intended to minimise resource extraction and waste, and thereby reduce humans’ ecological footprints. Urban areas are central to this because – although cities occupy only 2–3% of the planet’s land surface – as much as 70–75% of natural resources are consumed within them (UNEP, n.d.).

While cities can be significant contributors to climate change and resource scarcity, and face considerable risks as a consequence of these, they can also be understood as being central to the solutions for these challenges (UNEP 2013). The quality of infrastructure, reliability of service provision and other economic and political conditions in urban areas shape levels of resource use by, and exposure to risks for, residents. High population densities mean that services and infrastructure can be provided more efficiently, offering opportunities to meet basic needs while reducing the economic and ecological costs of doing so (Turok and McGranahan 2013). Urban areas are also hubs of economic activity, knowledge and innovation, making them strategic sites for engaging and experimenting with new ways of living, moving, governing and working (Floater et al. 2014). This suggests that urban areas, if harnessed effectively, have the potential to enable more sustainable modes of development both within and beyond city boundaries.

Decision-makers from cities around the world are accordingly designing and implementing strategies to improve resilience and resource efficiency. Specific examples of this are provided later in this introduction and throughout the papers in this special issue. They are supported by a range of international networks, including ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability, 100 Resilient Cities and the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, and initiatives including the Urban Low Emissions Development Strategy, the UNISDR Making Cities Resilient Campaign and the carBonn climate registry.¹

While resilience and resource efficiency have gained prominence within the urban sustainability agenda, there has been very little conceptual or practical consideration of the relationship between the two agendas. This means that decision-makers and practitioners (including national and local governments, the private sector and civil society) may not understand or address complementarities or conflicts between them. This special issue brings together research that explores links between the principles, objectives and types of initiatives associated with resilience and resource management in the urban sphere. The purpose is to investigate and question the relationship between the two concepts, as well as to identify practical opportunities for mutual reinforcement or sources of tension between these objectives. Above all, the research presented in this special issue demonstrates that framing a nexus between resilience and resource efficiency can help planners to achieve a wide range of sustainable development goals (SDGs), including economic prosperity and social development.

Introducing (urban) resilience

The concept of resilience is drawn from ecology, describing the capacity of ecosystems to return to equilibria after disturbance and variability (Folke 2006). Applying this principle to the social sciences, urban resilience can be defined as: ‘The ability of a city or urban system to withstand shocks and threats, to survive stresses, utilise them, reorganise, develop whilst retaining the essential same functions and identity, and to adapt to social, political, economic and environmental change’ (adapted from Carpenter and Folke 2006; Monteiro et al. 2012).

Resilience is commonly used as a conceptual framework to guide climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction. However, communities can build resilience to a range of other types of disturbances, such as energy shocks and food scarcity. Of course, urban resilience is not necessarily desirable if it means that decision-makers accept rather than address the underlying causes of disaster (Evans 2011) or that cities are locked into unsustainable, unproductive or socially exclusive forms and functions. Resilience can therefore be more helpfully understood as the capacity of a system to cope with new shocks or stressors, and to use the impetus of change to address other challenges that constrain lives and livelihoods (Dodman et al. 2009; Olazabal et al. 2012). In other words, building resilience is about fostering resourcefulness and reducing risks in a way that improves human well-being and ecological functioning, rather than merely maintaining the status quo – described by some scholars as ‘transformation’ (Pelling 2011; Chelleri et al. 2015).

This debate reveals that – in contrast to the more technocratic concept of resource efficiency – there is clearly normative element to resilience, as debates about change and stability are linked to questions about what a good community and local government might look like (Duit et al. 2010; Satterthwaite and Dodman 2013). The concept of resilience goes beyond simply reducing risks to ‘enhancing a system’s performance in the face of multiple hazards, rather than preventing or reducing the loss of assets caused by specific events’ (Arup 2014, p. 3). Pursuing and investing in urban resilience can therefore foster broader capacities for sustainable development (Chelleri et al. 2015).

Introducing (urban) resource efficiency

At the simplest level, resource efficiency refers to reducing the inputs required to produce a desired output; producing a higher level of outputs with the same level of inputs; or recycling and reusing materials more effectively. Resource efficiency involves assessing the whole life cycle of resources – from the extraction of raw materials to final use and waste disposal – from a value chain perspective (UNEP 2010). By undertaking resource assessments, urban decision-makers can evaluate their resource base: the resources available to them; where resources are entering the city; what processes these resources go through; and where the outputs are exported. These assessments enable decision-makers to identify opportunities to improve resource efficiency, which can reduce both the environmental impacts and financial costs of production and consumption.

A resource-efficient city can be defined as one that minimises resource extraction, energy consumption and waste generation, while simultaneously safeguarding ecosystem systems (UNEP, n.d.). Although the city scale is important, most of the resources required by urban populations are supplied externally while much infrastructure serving urban areas transcends municipal boundaries. Urban resource assessments and resource efficiency strategies must therefore consider the material and energy flows to and from a city’s hinterland (Kennedy et al. 2012; Seto et al. 2012).

Despite its usefulness, resource efficiency is an imperfect indicator for sustainability. This is partially because improvements in resource efficiency may be offset by increases in consumption, so that the ecological footprint actually grows (even if it does not grow as much as it may have done without efficiency gains) (Steinberger and Krausmann 2011). Moreover, prioritising resource efficiency does not necessarily deliver socially, environmentally and economically optimal outcomes. For example, waste management options with significant mitigation potential, such as landfill gas utilisation and energy-from-waste infrastructure, are often not as economically attractive as those that offer smaller carbon savings, such as composting or waste prevention (Papargryopoulou et al. 2015). Similarly, formalising municipal solid waste management may increase the proportion of waste that is collected and reused, but at the expense of the informal recycling sector (scavengers and waste pickers) (Wilson et al. 2006; Chikarmane 2012). This example illustrates a wider point: urban resource efficiency programmes must be designed and delivered with care so that they redress rather than perpetuate social inequalities (Colenbrander et al. 2017).

Exploring the nexus between resilience and resource efficiency

The concepts of resilience and resource efficiency provide different languages, metaphors and tools for understanding urban development. Exploring the concepts both independently and in association allows planners and decision-makers to identify possible synergies and tensions between the two. Both agendas provide a useful set of ideas to understand and address uncertainty and risk in a changing world, and aim to move away from business-as-usual approaches to avoid the decline and eventual collapse of urban systems. Both implicitly (and, at times, explicitly) accept the goal of operating within ecological limits to ensure that natural systems can continue to offer critical inputs and services. Both involve optimising resource flows, although the agendas may result in contrasting conclusions about what is optimal. Common areas of action may allow city leaders to adopt measures that can help achieve both improved resilience and greater resource efficiency (Daudey and Matsumoto 2017).

This special issue is one output of a work programme involving the United Nations Environment Programme (UN Environment) and the International Institute for Environment and Development to identify and promote the nexus between resilience and resource efficiency in cities. The overall approach taken to resource efficiency and resilience was strongly informed through a series of regional round-table workshops, involving city officials from Asia, Africa and Latin America – who presented case studies including the ones in the box below. The programme was strongly oriented towards the needs and priorities of medium-sized cities in middle-income countries, where many of the opportunities and challenges of linking resilience and resource efficiency are most clearly seen. The insights of the papers presented here and the inputs of the city officials contributed to a policy-oriented report (Dodman et al. 2017) and contributions to the development of the New Urban Agenda, including events at the Habitat III conference. The approach presented here therefore links practical and policy concerns with more analytical approaches.

Semarang, Indonesia

Semarang is the capital city of the Central Java Province, and a major port city with over 1.5 million inhabitants. Almost half of these people are not supplied by the municipal water system. If current water supply practices are maintained and population growth continues at its current rate, it is projected that the city’s water demand will exceed its supply by 2025 (ACCCRN 2013). These pressures are likely to be exacerbated with climate change, particularly sea-level rise and extreme weather events (Mulyana et al. 2013).

Among other resilience actions, such as flood early warning systems, mangrove planting and plot terracing, Semarang is in the process of diversifying its water supply system. It is scaling up a rainwater harvesting pilot programme to the city scale and constructing a series of recharge wells and biopores (organic holes increasing the soil’s water absorption capacity) (Saroso 2014; Iglesias et al. 2015). These projects aim to build climate resilience by increasing clean water accessibility, reducing run-off during flood events, reducing communities’ reliance on groundwater extraction and increasing the quantity of groundwater reserves whilst addressing land subsidence problems (Sutarto and Jarvie 2012). In the process of building resilience, these actions also considerably improve the efficiency of water use (increasing rainwater capture and reducing groundwater consumption) and conserve land and biodiversity resources around the city by limiting salinisation and erosion.

Khon Kaen City, Thailand

Khon Kaen Province has the largest waste dump in the north-east region of Thailand, with 800,000 tons of rubbish accumulated for future disposal at the dump sites of 26 districts. These dumps expose citizens to serious health risks, including disease, contamination of water supplies, air pollution and fire hazards.

Khon Kaen City, a municipality of 100,000 people, is constructing a power station that will use this solid waste to generate electricity. It is designed to treat 450 tons of garbage on a daily basis, thereby eliminating the accumulated garbage over a period of 7 years. The dumpsite will in turn be transformed into a recreation space for the local community. The plant is expected to generate 4.9MWh of electricity per day over an operating lifespan of 20 years (Janphrom 2015). Waste-to-energy is a classic example of circular economy thinking, turning waste from a problem into a valuable resource. However, this project also enhances the resilience of the city by addressing potential health and environmental risks caused by inadequate waste management practices, while reducing dependency on fossil fuels.

Lima, Peru

After Cairo, Lima is the world’s most populous city located in a desert (Kerres 2010). It is therefore little surprise that the city faces a high risk of water shortages, compounded by fragmented urban planning and poor water management. The city is dependent on water supplies from the Andean Mantaro river basin and the wetlands of Junin and Pasco, which are threatened by melting glaciers and dwindling groundwater stocks (Hordijk et al. 2013; Miranda Sara and Baud 2014). This water is pumped and diverted to Lima through complex mega-infrastructure. Within Lima, inequalities in supply infrastructure mean that low-income groups do not always benefit from the distribution system.

The ‘Lima Ecological Infrastructure Strategy’ (LEIS) aims to improve spatial planning, land-use efficiency and urban water management (Eisenberg et al. 2014). Recognising the multiple services that natural ecosystems can provide, a series of green open spaces are being established that will purify urban wastewater, recycle nutrients, protect groundwater from contamination and enable its recharge. This strategy also creates recreational space. It is thus a way of promoting land and water efficiency simultaneously (Poblet et al. 2013; Miranda Sara and Baud 2014). If successful, the LEIS will reduce dependency on dwindling freshwater resources and help to restore the integrity of the hydrological cycle in Lima’s hinterland. These water and land efficiency initiatives therefore also offer an opportunity to improve resilience to the impacts of climate change.

The nexus between resilience and resource efficiency shows that considering both agendas together can help cities realise significant co-benefits. However, tensions between resource efficiency and resilience may also exist. Possible trade-offs between the two agendas are evident when we consider ‘extreme’ resilient systems and ‘extreme’ resource-efficient systems (Elmqvist 2014). An electricity grid, for instance, may be served by a few large power plants producing just enough energy to meet demand. This is a very cost-efficient approach to energy generation, but one which is vulnerable to power outages due to human or technical failures at the power plants or in the connective infrastructure. By comparison, decentralised electricity generation (based on a series of smaller systems) offers more scope for load transfer and load sharing so grid supply may be more reliable in the event of shocks (Mooallem 2013). Energy security can also be enhanced by having significant spare capacity, for example, in the form of fossil fuel stockpiles or through investment in additional generation capacity, even though this may not be consistent with narrowly defined efficiency goals.

Possible tensions between social resilience and resource efficiency are particularly significant. A public transport system powered by renewable energy can be highly efficient – yet not contribute to equitable accessibility to serve the resilience requirements of low-income neighbourhoods. A feed-in tariff to support the rollout of solar photovoltaic technology effectively means that low-income households, who cannot afford the high capital costs of solar panels, subsidise the electricity consumption of high-income households. Mandatory energy efficiency standards might increase the costs of consumer goods so that low-income households struggle to cover the upfront costs of, for example, air conditioners or light bulbs (Colenbrander et al. 2015). Urban governance arrangements need to be flexible, responsive and adequately resourced – to the point where there may be redundant networks and connections within and among levels of government – to ensure that there is capacity to identify, prepare for and respond to hazards (Satterthwaite and Dodman 2013).

The nature and importance of these trade-offs directly depends on the context of implementation and choices made around regulatory and financing instruments. In some contexts, resource security is not targeted in the short-term (for example, spare resources will be required to meet social needs in the occurrence of a hazard), but will be a priority in order to achieve resilience in the longer term (Roelich et al. 2013, 2015). Various geographic and temporal scales of action thus help define objectives and determine how they might complement or conflict with each other. This underscores the necessity of analysing resilience (‘of what, to what and for whom’), as well as resources (‘what is available, what is under pressure and how do they interact’).

What does achieving resilience and resource efficiency at city level mean in more practical terms? Translating goals that are shared by both resilience and resource efficiency agendas into concrete actions reveals possible ways to achieve common objectives through one set of activities, but may also highlight potential contradictions. Some short-term strategies to strengthen economic resilience may increase pressure on ecosystems and thus lead to inefficient resource use: for example, land-use change through intense cultivation and livestock production might require large quantities of water or lead to irreversible soil degradation. Engineering or technological solutions that reduce dependence on fossil fuels, such as hydroelectricity and nuclear plants, may not contribute to resilience (or, indeed, to broader environmental objectives). However, this does not mean that the two agendas are contradictory, but rather that they need to be viewed in association with each other, and possible areas of tension reconciled.

This is apparent when we consider areas of action that are important for both the urban resilience and resource efficiency agendas (Figure 1). Decision-makers can identify and adopt measures in these areas that can potentially contribute to the achievement of both objectives. However, specific interventions need to be considered against a wider range of criteria to ensure that they support inclusive, sustainable development. These measures need to be delivered at different scales and across different sectors, underscoring the importance of a coordinated multi-level, cross-sectoral governance framework so that promising opportunities in urban areas can be realised (Acuto, 2013; Gouldson et al. 2016).

Figure 1. Areas of action to build resilient and resource-efficient cities.

Introducing the special issue

In the light of the potential contradictions and complementarities identified above, the papers in this special issue each explore a different aspect of the relationship between resilience and resource efficiency, shedding light into the opportunities and challenges facing urban decision-makers in the pursuit of more sustainable patterns of urban development. They include papers that concentrate on the conceptual dimensions of resource efficiency and resilience, and papers with a stronger empirical focus rooted in particular locations.

Salat (2017) and Bozza et al. (2017) address the concepts of resource efficiency and resilience in the context of urban form, infrastructure and services. Salat (2017) uses a mathematical model to test the relationship between resilience and spatial hierarchies in a series of global cities, including New York, Paris and London. This evidence informs a discussion on how resilience is shaped by urban form, which in turn is determined by patterns of human density and activity at different scales. Bozza et al. (2017) develop a methodology to quantify the disaster resilience of urban areas, focusing on the Italian city of Sarno as well as hypothetical urban forms. The authors model the relationships between the physical and social components of cities as graphs, and then run seismic scenarios in order to assess different recovery strategies. The results can help city planners to optimise both the resilience of a city and the efficiency of its disaster response and recovery plans. Their findings show that resource efficiency measures can enhance economic resilience both by reducing exposure to unreliable supply chains and by creating fiscal space, but highlight that there may be conflicts between efficiency and other social or environmental goals.

Urban metabolic flows in Mexico and Malaysia are considered by Delgado Ramos and Guibrunet (2017) and Puppim de Oliviera (2017), respectively. Delgado Ramos and Guibrunet (2017) introduce the Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories and use the case of Mexico City to deliberate on the scope for a more integrated understanding of energy and material urban (in)efficiencies and plausible mitigation potentials, with a focus on waste. They then offer suggestions about more robust and holistic methods to engage with resource use and risk at the community scale. In comparison, Puppim de Oliviera (2017) presents ways that resilience can affect urban development in adverse ways, for example through systemic reproduction of conflicts, capacity deficits and resource shortfalls. Using the waste sector in Penang, Malaysia, as an example, this paper tries to understand how to break the resilience of urban systems in order to realise sustainability goals. His research reveals the importance of an engaged civil society and constructive intergovernmental relations if cities are to pursue urban environmental agendas.

Mundoli et al. (2017) and Fragkias et al. (2017) explore resilience and resource efficiency in the context of natural ecosystems in urban areas. Mundoli et al. (2017) discuss the range of ecosystem services provided by wooded groves around Bengaluru in India. They show how the degradation and transformation of these forest spaces has limited urban residents’ access to water and livelihoods, while associated demographic and institutional changes have made collective action challenging. This loss of wooded groves has reduced the social and ecological resilience of urban residents, particularly traditional and vulnerable users such as migrant workers and low-income families. Fragkias et al. (2017) explore the relationship between urbanisation, sustainability and land use through the lens of teleconnections. By developing quantitative models that explore threshold effects and their impacts, he shows how different structures of interdependency between cities and their hinterland can affect system resilience.

Finally, Daudey and Matsumoto (2017) examine how individuals, institutions and governance networks determine resource efficiency and resilience in urban areas. They examine five fast-growing Southeast Asian cities – Bandung (Indonesia), Iskandar Malaysia (Malaysia), Cebu (the Philippines), Bangkok (Thailand) and Hai Phong (Vietnam) – to identify cases where integrating resource efficiency objectives into policy could improve urban resilience to natural disasters. They identify particularly significant opportunities in the land use, water, energy and solid waste sectors. Daudey and Matsumoto conclude by highlighting how national government leadership and the mobilisation of urban communities can drive action by local governments.

The papers in this special issue therefore provide a compelling evidence base on the importance of considering urban resilience and resource efficiency alongside each other. They provide examples of ways that the process of building resilience can offer opportunities to improve resource efficiency, and test the extent to which greater efficiency can increase urban resilience by reducing exposure to the risk of resource shortfalls. There is therefore significant scope for mutual reinforcement between these agendas, as long as city leaders are also aware of potential tensions between them. Exploiting prospective complementarities and overcoming any conflicts will require more integrated and responsive urban planning and governance, supported by effective national policy frameworks, and involve a range of urban stakeholders.

Conclusion

Cities around the world are facing a range of interconnected challenges and opportunities linked to growing demographic and environmental pressures. For urban centres to survive and thrive, they need to not only redress these different pressures, but also respond in ways that foster prosperity, well-being, environmental sustainability and transformative capacities. Improving resilience and resource efficiency is a key element of this.

Enhancing the resilience and resource efficiency of cities also speaks directly to global agendas, including the SDGs, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the New Urban Agenda of Habitat III. Even where cities may be considered only one area of action (as with the SDGs) or one level of action (as with the UNFCCC), their socio-economic significance and dynamism means that they can make a particularly significant and far-reaching contribution. The resilience and resource efficiency frameworks both use multi-scale perspectives that recognise the catalytic role that cities can play in shaping individual behaviour and influencing national and global policy.

Addressing the nexus of resilience and resource efficiency in urban areas therefore has the potential to generate social, economic and environmental returns far beyond those which could be achieved by addressing these agendas separately. Addressing resilience on its own is inadequate given the scale of the environmental challenges, including resource scarcity, that urban areas will face. Pursuing resource efficiency on its own is insufficient because it fails to account for the social and environmental context in which cities will find themselves. And the scale of the city is critical because the concentration of people, ideas and resources create opportunities for action that are not present elsewhere. The opportunity is one that ambitious cities, city leaders and citizens cannot afford to miss.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by UN Environment as part of the Global Initiative for Resource Efficient Cities.

Notes on contributors

David Dodman

David Dodman is the Director of the Human Settlements Group at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and a Teaching Fellow in the Development Planning Unit, University College London. He is co-editor of books on ‘Adapting Cities to Climate Change’ (2009) and ‘Responding to Climate Change in Asian Cities’ (2016), and was a Lead Author in the Fifth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Loan Diep

Loan Diep works as an Independent Researcher aside of her role as Project Officer with Water & Sanitation for the Urban Poor (WSUP). She recently co-authored reports on the resilience of water providers during the Middle East and North Africa conflicts, as well as the UN Environment report on Resilience and Resource Efficiency in Cities.

Sarah Colenbrander

Sarah Colenbrander is a researcher with the International Institute for Environment and Development, associate with the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy and senior economist with the Coalition for Urban Transitions. In addition to her academic publications on cities and climate change, she has co-authored reports for the New Climate Economy, UN Environment and World Bank.

Notes

1. Websites for these networks and programmes: www.iclei.org; www.100resilientcities.org; www.c40.org; www.urbanleds.iclei.org; www.unisdr.org/campaign/resilientcities; www.carbonn.org.