Towards Climate Neutrality: Global Perspective and Actions for Net-Zero Buildings to Achieve Climate Change Mitigation and the SDGs

Abstract

The continuous rise in energy demands due to rapid urbanization and human activities puts immense pressure on local governments and cities globally, especially amidst the COVID-19 crisis and economic slowdown. Hence, developing cities and buildings towards net-zero goals is becoming urgent and significantly vital to adopt renewable scenarios in the building sector given the climate crisis. The outcome of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Conference of Parties (COP26) agreed on and declared the Glasgow Climate Pact (GCP) which stated the serious concern of climate and weather extremes and their adverse impacts on people and nature that will continue to increase with an additional increment of rising temperature. The GCP reaffirmed the long-term global goal to hold the increase in global average temperature to well below 2 °C below-industrial real levels in addition to recognizing that limiting global warming to 1.5 entails rapid, deep, and sustained reduction in global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 45% by 2030 and to contribute towards climate-neutral cities and reasserted the goal of net-zero by 2050. Hence, city leaders should focus on reducing carbon emissions by 2050. Nevertheless, if global warming is to be limited to 1.5 °C, all cities need to be net-zero by 2050 at the very latest. Therefore, net-zero, low-carbon building and clean mobility can play a great role in achieving climate neutrality by 2050. This book chapter aims to address the urgent need to transform the building industry and cities to become low carbon. The chapter highlights the importance of net-zero low-carbon cities. It also presents global examples of net-zero-energy buildings (NZEBs) and how these models contribute to the net-zero target and climate neutrality. Additionally, current policies, actions, and initiatives worldwide and in Egypt towards NZEB to achieve green and sustainable cities have also been examined and discussed. Ultimately, net-zero carbon and managing “transition” remain a huge challenge for cities and regions, but coupling these goals with innovative thinking for the future is primarily essential if cities worldwide are to become resilient enough and meet COP26 outcomes and the GCP.KeywordsCarbon emissionsClimate neutralityEnergyLow-carbon citiesNet-zeroPolicies