Abstract
With cities considered the main source of carbon emissions, urban planning could mitigate and help adapt to climate change, given the allocation and regulation of public policies of urban spatial resources. China’s regulatory planning remains the basis for building permission in the original urban and rural planning, and the new territorial spatial planning systems, determining the quality of urban plan implementation. Comprehensive regulatory plans effectively reduce carbon emissions. This study employs Q methodology to compare and analyze urban planners’ and practitioners’ perceptions of China’s regulatory planning in climate change mitigation and adaptation. The findings show that while regulatory planning is key, potential deficiencies include the gaps between regulatory from master plans, capacity shortages of designations and indicators, and unequal rights and responsibilities of local governments. However, mandatory indicators in regulatory planning, especially “greening rate,” “building density,” “land use type,” and “application of renewable energy technologies to the development of municipal infrastructure” could effectively mitigate climate change. “Greening rate” is the core indicator in regulatory planning since it provides empirical evidence for the “green space effect”. This study indicates that local customization of combined regulation of greening rate and green spaces could help mitigate and help China adapt to climate change.
Highlights
According to the levels of planning, climate change mitigation and adaptation in urban planning can be categorized into two types: the development strategy of balancing economic growth and green and low-carbon development, which could reflect in the practice of macroeconomic governance, and the technical regulation in urban plans that could achieve the goals of efficient energy use and emission reduction
Regarding climate change mitigation, existing studies have found that compact land development mode [21], low urban population density, high degree of integration of urban spatial structure and traffic system [22], average building height, and plot ratio [23] have a certain impact on carbon emissions
Through the analysis of experts’ and practitioners’ perceptions, the Q methodology application in this study provides a professional perspective of the effectiveness of regulatory planning in climate change mitigation and adaptation
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. According to the levels of planning, climate change mitigation and adaptation in urban planning can be categorized into two types: the development strategy of balancing economic growth and green and low-carbon development, which could reflect in the practice of macroeconomic governance, and the technical regulation in urban plans that could achieve the goals of efficient energy use and emission reduction. Target responsibility systems have been developed and applied to performance assessment, focusing on the achievement of carbon emission reduction goals. Whether the development of regulatory plans could effectively achieve the goals of carbon emission reduction would be of great significance for China to mitigate and adapt to the impact of climate change. How can these designations and indicators be appropriately applied to regulate urban development, achieving the goals of climate change mitigation and adaptation at the city scale? The main research questions are as follows: What are the adaptabilities of the respective designations and indicators in climate change mitigation and adaptation at the city scale? How can these designations and indicators be appropriately applied to regulate urban development, achieving the goals of climate change mitigation and adaptation at the city scale?
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