Overview

ENVS2007 (Green Futures) is an undergraduate module offered by the Bartlett School of Planning and open to students from outside the department. This module is worth 0.5 units and does not require any pre-requisites.
The module examines some of the key environmental debates and literature, with a specific focus on cities and the future of cities. It is structured under two main parts.

Part ONE – We first undertake a wider theoretical overview. This part examines how the current environmental crisis impacts on cities on the broader context of population growth and current urbanization trends; it explores how contemporary industrial societies are dealing with the environmental crisis and environmental concerns are integrated into policies from other domains and what the relationship between economic development and environmental protection is; it also looks at current shifts in behaviour toward the environment and how cities might look like in a near or far away future. Throughout this first part a series of key environmental concepts will be explored including Climate Change denial, low carbon development, ecological modernisation, environmentalism, environmental policy integration, pro-environmental behaviour, value-action gap, environmental economics, futures thinking and scenario development.

Part TWO – Following the Reading Week in February, we move on to explore in more detail how some of the concepts and ideas discussed in Part One are applied in the area of green or digital technology and smart city design; energy efficiency and high-rise retrofitting; travel patterns and transport futures; energy decentralisation; and the ‘building’ of green communities. Throughout the second part, lectures will be delivered by a number of invited guests and entail a breadth of international and UK-based examples.

Teaching and Learning Methods

Each class usually consists of 1h lecture from staff, followed by 1h seminar where discussions draw on student presentations. Each student presentation will address one of the 2 questions asked by each seminar topic and will focus on examining more closely some of the issues discussed in that week’s lecture.

Aims & Outcomes

ENVS2007 overall aim is to broaden the students’ understanding of the tensions and synergies between ‘man-made’ development and the environment, and to provide a cross-sectoral evaluation of how these manifest in practice, drawing on a range of UK and international examples.

It also aims to provide students with both the skills to conceptualise various topics from environmental studies as well as the ability to explore some of these concepts and ideas in practice by looking at a range of ‘cases’ or applications in the area of green technology and innovation, retrofitting, urban energy and transportation, and green community ‘engineering’.

Structure/Outline

Staff

Main: Dr Catalina Turcu
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Others 

Professor Patrick McAllister
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Dr Susan Moore
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Dr Robin Hickman
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Professor Anne Power (LSE)

Mike Duff (WSP)

Assessment

Coursework: 100% (80% individual essay + 20% group presentations).

Indicative Reading

To be provided during each lecture.