Comment on Bettignies et al. The Scale-Dependent Behaviour of Cities: A Cross-Cities Multiscale Driver Analysis of Urban Energy Use. Sustainability 2019, 11, 3246

Abstract

Bettignies et al. examine power-law relationships between drivers of energy use and urban features at city and infra-city levels for ten different cities in six countries across four continents, featuring a wide distribution of urban indicators from various data sources. The authors employ univariate linear regression models using selected log-transformed indicators to investigate whether the intensity of energy use scales with urban indicators such as population size, density, and income. Bettignies et al. suggest that based on their findings, the urban energy-use drivers are in fact scale-dependent, and that their results reveal a substantial heterogeneity across and within cities. They reference this as why more consideration needs to be paid to local factors when devising urban policy. On this note, we argue that Bettignies et al. appear to have not only misunderstood the urban scaling literature they have cited, but have also employed flawed methodological design in their analysis that ultimately leaves their conclusions unsubstantiated.