In spite of their enormous requirements for materials and energy, and their enormous generation of wastes, many see urban living as the sustainable future for most of humankind in the twenty-first century. But there are serious issues for urban areas, especially very large ones in both the developed and developing world, given the interrelated problems of climate change, and energy and resource scarcity, and the importance of natural systems for society. These interrelated problems will pose constraints for all of society, but they will be much more challenging and difficult to solve for very large urban areas. Let’s look at this in more detail.
Image: STEFAN LANGMANN Flickr
