Net zero cities

With most people now living in urban areas – half of the world’s population in fact – cities play an important role in both mitigating and adapting to a rapidly changing climate. To address this, cities around the world are developing net zero strategies to reduce their carbon emissions and protect communities and infrastructure. At Sweco, we have the multi-disciplinary expertise and experience to support – and scale – your net zero ambitions.

Currently, global temperatures are set to go beyond a 1.5˚C limit in the next 4-5 years, climbing to above preindustrial levels. Scientific evidence strongly points to human activities being a key cause in global warming. Indeed, cities are both a significant cause and impact of climate change. With 68% of the world’s population moving to urban areas by 2050, cities play a critical role in achieving net zero.

However, to do this requires a drastic reduction of carbon emissions from energy, transport, buildings and urban infrastructure as part of a wider green transition. This means that cities must consider – and re-evaluate – all of their activities and the impact they may have on reaching net zero targets. The net zero actions we introduce to urban areas today, for example changing from fossil fuel–based private vehicles to electric vehicles, or switching to renewable energy in our workplaces and homes, all have a direct role to play in reducing carbon emissions and mitigating the impact of climate change.

At Sweco, we help cities around the world to develop net zero strategies, and implement them effectively to slow down and even counter the climate emergency. We have a wealth of multi-disciplinary experience across all sectors, and we draw on this expertise when designing and implementing net zero projects – combining international skill sets with local insights to co-create tailored solutions.

Globally, we are experiencing the impacts of a changing climate. With an increase in carbon emissions – unless we act now – the likelihood of irreversible catastrophic climate change is irrefutable.

Dr Katherine Maxwell Technical Director (Net Zero Cities)

Our net zero city focus areas

Our net zero cities experts primarily support public sector clients such as local authorities, as well as universities and large private sector organisations. Our solutions fall into two distinct, yet complementary pillars:

1. Net zero strategy & roadmaps

  • GHG emission inventory
  • Pathways modelling to net zero
  • Action identification and prioritisation
  • Roadmaps to net zero
  • Specialist analysis in: Air Quality, Ecology, Active travel, etc.

2. Planning for implementation

  • Monitoring, evaluating and reporting on progress
  • KPI development
  • Action design
  • High-level business case design
  • Project and programme design, delivery and evaluation

How we can support your net zero city projects

  • Climate finance
  • Identification of funding sources for actions
  • Grant application support
  • Just transition & governance
  • Mainstreaming net zero actions in local government

14 key considerations for a Net Zero City

Find out what our experts believe are the most important building blocks for carbon-conscious urbanisation.

How to build your net zero city strategy

Developing urban spaces more resiliently and sustainably has an enormous, positive impact on society as a whole, but also provides a huge area of opportunity for global-scale progress when it comes to achieving sustainable placemaking ambitions. Here, we provide a snapshot of the steps needed to formulate – and follow – a clear and actionable net zero city strategy.

1. Context

  1. Vision
  2. Carbon
  3. commitments
  4. Geography
  5. Socio-economic
  6. considerations
  7. City management and structure
  8. City powers

2. Emissions inventory

  1. GHG emissions baseline – emissions types, sources and quantities
  2. Sectoral focus (e.g. transport, buildings, energy)
  3. Data from local authority
  4. Clarify scopes (up/downstream)

3. Pathways to net zero

  1. Scenarios to net zero (BAU, regulatory, ambitious)
  2. Sector emissions hot spots to actions
  3. Take into account population and economic changes

4. Action prioritisation

  1. Long list to short list
  2. Set criteria for prioritisation, process and weighting
  3. MACC can help with this
  4. Define actions

Net zero strategy

  1. Roadmap to net zero (interim goals, key actions and investment)
  2. Evidence for all actions selected
  3. Monitoring, evaluation and reporting (e.g. KPIs)

Let’s transform society together

As we build new cities and communities, it is important we reduce embodied emissions through better design and new materials selection. Combining global expertise with local insights, we can work with you to apply leading class design and engineering solutions in the built environment, transport systems and across our energy, water and waste infrastructure.

Net zero is not just about reducing emissions. It’s also about improving health and wellbeing. We’ve seen far more of a holistic picture since the COVID 19 pandemic. We’ve realised that, in a just transition, you have to enhance access to employment and transport systems. It’s about improving quality of life.

Dr Katherine Maxwell Technical Director (Net Zero Cities)

5 steps to creating a net zero city strategy

We sat down with Net Zero Cities Technical Director Katherine Maxwell to get a snapshot of the steps needed to formulate – and follow – a clear and actionable net zero city strategy.

Dr Katherine Maxwell

Net Zero Cities Technical Director

Elle Bartleet

Assistant Carbon Consultant

Monika Potomska

Senior Sustainability Consultant