Sustainability as a Reaction to Pollution

The Sustainable Cities emerged as a reaction to the industrial development and the spread of advanced technology, which led to the spread of pollution, which has become part of the contemporary world and that it has spread in all aspects of life and has several forms, whether, in climate pollution which spread through the effect of carbon dioxide and methane, that cause damage to public health and Methane is considered the most dangerous to the planet. Methane gas has a number of sources:

• Natural gas fields, where methane gas is considered the main component of natural gas, with about 87% of the total extracted gas
• Biogas, methane gas production is a part of the biogas production process through fermentation and decaying of organic materials such as manure and sewage
• Animal waste, some animals produce methane gas as part of the organic waste, for example, cows produce about 16% of the amount of methane on Earth
• Atmospheric methane, which naturally resides as fixed ratios in the atmosphere, but these proportions changed in recent years significantly due to climate pollution

The rapid-ignition methane is one of the most dangerous greenhouse gasses, which exceeds carbon dioxide by about 25 times and is considered the biggest threat to the planet due to its effect on global warming.

In addition, the concept of sustainable cities first appeared as a scientific term referring to cities based on clean energy in 1987. The first to use this term was “Richard Register” in his book, “Ecocity Berkeley: Building Cities for a Healthy Future” and one of the most popular supporters to the concept of Sustainable Cities is the architect Paul F Downton founder and owner of the company “Ecopolis Architects PTY Ltd.” and also author “Timothy Beatley” and “Steffen Lehmann”, who have many publications in the field of sustainable urban, energy and the sources and means of reducing pollution.

“Green architecture” is a generic term intended to refer to the environmental awareness in the field of architecture and of the most important principles of green architecture is to save energy.

Sustainability designed to meet the needs of modern generations without ignoring the needs of future generations, by increasing green spaces to face environmental pollution, as well as reliance on clean and renewable energy sources, through recycling and limiting other untapped wastes, as well as energy from waste extraction.

You can browse several specifications put forward by scientists to describe the sustainable Cities:

• The existence of plans for green space that is used in agriculture to meet the needs of citizens for food and products
• The existence of renewable energy sources like wind, water or biogas that is extracted from the sewage stations
• The existence of sources to reduce air adjustments, such as planting trees and creating natural ventilation systems for homes and increasing the area of water bodies and green spaces should not be less than 20% of the total urban area
• Improve public transport and reduce its dependence on fossil fuels and tending to increase its dependence on electrical energy in transportation and increase pedestrian spaces to reduce the use of means of transport.
• The existence of means to minimize the urban sprawl through finding ways to live near work areas
• Urban systems dependent on renewable energy source such as solar energy
• The use of technological means in the devices have that have the ability to save energy

The most interested science in the concept of sustainability is the architecture and through the application of the concept of sustainability in construction and urban planning and the work of restructuring the industrial cities and urban areas to cope with the scientific concepts of sustainability, and architectural designer must take into consideration, during the design of Green Cities or Sustainable Cities, the city’s environmental analysis, as well as creating green spaces, as well as the use of recycling in all aspects of construction, as well as reliance on renewable energy sources such as wind and solar energy and hydropower, also the industrial enterprises must have facilities for waste treatment, recycling and reusing it in other industries, there also must be means for rain flowing to estuaries can be used in renewable energy generation.

Sustainable Cities aim to restructure urban density in spite of the absence of international standards for sustainable cities, but there is the organization of the “United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG)”, which contains 60 members from across the world that aim to develop standards and theses cities sustainability and urban development.

There are several examples of sustainable cities around the world on the top of theses sustainable cities in the world, Zurich at the top of the Sustainable Cities increased by 74.6%, came in second place Singapore City increased by 74.1%, Stockholm increased by 73.9%, Vienna increased by 73.4%, London increased by 73.2 %, Frankfurt increased by 70.6%, Seoul increased by 69.6%, Hamburg increased by 69.2%, Prague increased by 69.1% and Munich increased by 68.6%.

In terms of the Middle East and developing cities are the cities of Abu Dhabi and Dubai on top of sustainable cities in the Middle East, where the Dubai and Abu Dhabi succeeded in reducing energy consumption by more than 33% and by following the standards for sustainability and clean energy.

We must mention the role of the known certificate “LEED” that assess the degree of sustainability in buildings or cities, and have several criteria including sustainable location as well as efficient use of clean energy whether it’s the wind, water or solar energy or sewage, and also assess the quality of the internal environment and innovation as well as degrees in design and the degree of decomposition of waste and recycling and also undermine certification to the degree of improvement of energy and this enhances the level of creative thinking in finding creative forms of power generation and increase waste recycling efficiency.