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The continued outward growth from a central business district has been the dominant characteristic of most cities in Australia. However, this feature is seen as unsustainable and alternative scenarios to contain the outward growth are being proposed. Melbourne is currently grappling with this issue while simultaneously trying to reduce per capita greenhouse gas emissions. Housing size, style and its location are the three principal factors which determine the emissions from the residential sector. This paper describes a methodology to assess the combined impact of these factors on past and possible future forms of residential development in Melbourne. The analysis found that the location of the housing and its size are the dominant factors determining energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.

Researchers at the Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology (LUT) in Finland and Energy Watch Group (EWG) have completed a 4½ year study that examined how to meet the goals of the Paris climate accords without such measures as carbon capture and geoengineering. Their conclusion? Run everything on electricity and generate all of that electricity using renewables, primarily solar.

A team headed by Stanford’s Mark Z. Jacobson outlined plans for 139 nations to transition to 100 percent clean, renewable energy by the year 2050.

The shift would also allow the countries to avoid the 3 percent they now spend in their Gross Domestic Products to address the costs of air pollution — mainly in the form of higher health care spending.

The plan maps each country and the energy sources it would rely on to reach the 100 percent renewable goal. Water-bound and geologically active Iceland would get 28 percent of its power from hydroelectric sources and nearly 23 percent from geothermal. Parched and wide-open Australia would get nearly 45 percent of its power from wind farms. Poland would get nearly two-thirds of its power from the wind.