Research

The potential and costs of district heating networks

The report provides an assessment of the potential costs and benefits of district heating, calculating the UK potential and assessing the economic and non-economic barriers to further investment and deployment.

Adaptation Strategies for Climate Change in the Urban Environment (ASCCUE)

The ASCCUE report focuses on the urban environment with a view to assessing climate change impacts and developing and testing appropriate adaptation responses through spatial planning and urban design.

The Sustainable Cities: Options for Responding to Climate Change Impacts and Outcomes (SCORCHIO)

This tool models land uses to better represent urban climate feedbacks (UKCIP scenarios assumes the whole UK to be rural). The model will enable users to ‘optioneer’ by providing options to compensate for high density developments which are vulnerable to high temperatures under different climate scenarios.

Local Urban Climate Model and its Application to the Intelligent Design of Cities (LUCID)

This project develops, test and apply modelling techniques which will allow the calculation of local climate in the urban environment based on dynamic and thermodynamic processes associated with land use and building form.

Adaptation and Resilience in Cities: Analysis and Decision making using Integrated Assessment (ARCADIA)

This study aims to provide system-scale understanding of the inter-relationships between climate impacts, the urban economy, land use, transport and the built environment and to use this understanding to design cities that are more resilient and adaptable.

Suburban Neighbourhood Adaptation for a Changing Climate (SNACC)

The University of the West of England is leading on this research project which seeks to answer the question: How can existing suburban neighbourhoods be best adapted to reduce further impacts of climate change and withstand ongoing changes? The research focuses on adaptations to the built environment, through changes to individual homes and larger neighbourhood scale adaptations. The project uses as case studies six neighbourhoods from three urban centres: Bristol, Stockport and Oxford.