Diss. Stockholm : Tekn. högsk., 2005.

Implementation of the Flood and Water Management Act (2010) will place increased responsibility on local planning authorities (LPAs) in England for planning approval and future maintenance of sustainable drainage (SUDS) installations. LPAs have limited experience in assessing SUDS, and there is a need for additional guidance to support decision making. A method was developed to analyse environmental and institutional characteristics of existing published datasets using a Geographical Information System (GIS), and to create maps indicating feasible locations for SUDS devices at the strategic scale of a full LPA area. The method was applied to an example study site: Coventry, UK, covering 98.7 km2, of which 33% was impermeable, estimated from Ordnance Survey land cover. The method was reliant on the accuracy of the underlying datasets, although data uncertainties were identified, e.g. the incorrect classification of some land cover and lack of definition in private gardens. Construction of a framework allowed a structured approach to collection and presentation of information, and is a point of reference for other strategic scale investigations of SUDS feasibility. Feasibility maps were generated for SUDS in new developments, on both greenfield and previously developed land, and for retrofit of existing developments, across five main categories of SUDS: source control, infiltration, filtration, conveyance, and detention & retention. In new developments, source control, filtration and detention & retention SUDS were possible in 99% of Coventry, filtration SUDS in 95% and infiltration solutions 17%. The higher number of restrictions imposed on retrofit resulted in a smaller area where SUDS were feasible: source control 68%, infiltration 11%, filtration 64%, conveyance 57% and detention 79%. Soil impermeability and depth to water table were the principal spatial limitations on infiltration and detention SUDS in new developments. Water bodies imposed the small number of restrictions on source control, filtration and conveyance in new developments. Existing land cover was the main driver of feasible locations for retrofit. Smaller parcels of land were available for retrofit (median 35 m2) than for new development (median 100 m2). Private gardens occupied 23% of the city, forming a large part of suburban land cover. Large scale retrofit in these areas would necessitate convincing a significant number of individual landowners of the benefits of SUDS. Use of feasibility maps created using the method developed in this research might encourage more specific and earlier consideration of SUDS in the planning process. Retrofit feasibility maps, in conjunction with datasets identifying problem locations, would assist strategic reviews of SUDS options.

The energy sector and the phenomenon of anthropogenic-induced cli-mate change are intrinsically related insofar as this sector is responsible for considerable emissions of greenhouse gas (GHG) due to fossil-fuel-based energy production facilities, namely electric power plants. The overall aim of the present work is to explore the relations and synergies between climate change and the energy sector as well as to explore the French example of PCET plans (Climate and Energy Territorial plans) that have been developed by local authorities for the past decade. Based on a literature review of the background for the issues of climate change and local planning, this works uses the strengths of participant observation and interviews with actors in the development of PCET to present the approach and discuss its characteristics and shortcomings. Since climate change is not only affecting and affected by both the supply- and demand-side of the energy sector, but is also related to numerous sectors such as housing and transportation, the need for com-prehensive plans has become more important at various levels of action. Although the PCET approach is recent and its impacts remain uncertain, it tackles fundamental public issues that are also potential aspects for development. While local authorities remain sceptical concerning their means of efficient action at the territorial level, a PCET plan may therefore have major consequences if it perceived as a comprehensive strategic tool rather than a simple action plan.

Ecosystem services are essential for human climate adaptation. As climate change is a direct driver of change for ecosystem service provisioning, it is of importance to care for our ecosystems to be able to cope with future challenges. Local governance has a central role in climate adaptation due to its responsibility in physical planning. To be able to plan for changes driven by climate change, a flexible, adaptive strategy is necessary. Ecosystem-based Adaptation, EbA, can provide this flexibility to an overall adaptation strategy. In this case study, the potential of EbA to help Nature-based Tourism, NbT, to adapt to a changing climate was spatially mapped to be a useful part of the basis for local physical planning. The mapping includes areas of biodiversity, water infrastructure and features that provide resilience to climate change. The results show that there are areas with potential for EbA that can address adverse effects of climate change for the NbT. These spatial mapped areas provide an instant overview of the key areas to consider when planning for climate adaptation. These mapped areas are also combined with a qualitative assessment of the potential for EbA. By providing decision-makers with information on where and how ecosystem services can assist local climate adaptation, decisions that support both the future of humanity and ecosystems are enabled. However, to reach enforcement of EbA, the knowledge has to be included in binding documents such as detail plans.

This report asks the question how to balance thepreservation of cultural built heritage against other publicand private interests in local planning. The aim of the studyis to contribute to knowledge about how different actors valuethe built heritage and how they interact in planning. The studydiscusses how this knowledge can be taken into account inplanning practice. As society develops further into a knowledgesociety, the valuation of local environmental qualities seemsto be more complex than during previous decades. For thatreason the maintenance of cultural built heritage is moredifficult to handle than before. The planning process has bytradition been characterised by a strong public sectorinvolvement and by strict procedural links to the regulationsystem. However, private initiatives have come to play anincreasingly important role in the planning process. Thesechanges have led to a situation where decision-making becomesinformal. The question is if planning functions in such waythat all values represented by different interests areconsidered carefully when decisions are made for preservation,renewal or change of the builtenvironment. There are reasonsto question the notion of citizen representation by localpoliticians and experts of various kinds. The theoreticalfoundation for the study is economic valuation theory, andespecially environmental economics, in combination withnegotiation theory and planning theory. These theories are usedas a starting point for an analysis of different actors’understanding of the cultural built heritage, their incentivesfor participating in planning, and, hence, for understandingthe interaction which determines preservation practice.Empirical findings are based on a case study of planning andheritage management in the municipality of Umeå. Itincludes studies of five recently completed planning processesconcerning specific real estate properties, as well as, aquestionnaire directed to a random selection of 1000inhabitants in the municipality. The study concludes that theoutcome of planning to a substantial part is depending of theinteraction and relations between the stakeholders, and, hence,structured by what has developed as the intellectual traditionand context of the city. The study shows that the builtenvironment seen as a public good in general is not fullyacknowledged and understood. Consequently, the private goodcharacteristic of the built environment is stressed inplanning, not only by private actors, but also by the publicsector. Furthermore, the study concludes that one importantissue in the management of the cultural built heritage is todraw on the actors’incentives for preservation, hence,paying more attention to the question of future direct andindirect use of the built heritage. An actor who primarilyfocuses on existence value runs the risk of being situated inthe margin of planning, with no real influence on decisionsconcerning heritage management.

Early perspectives on environmental issues have in general focussed on local pollution from specific sources. However, in past decades there has been a shift in society’s perspective on environmental management towards a focus on diffuse sources of pollution and long-term and global environmental issues. A systems approach to environmental issues has also been suggested in order to avoid overlooking important environmental issues. In this thesis, the potential of two Swedish legally regulated decision-making processes, the development permission process and the local planning process in the energy and waste sectors, to meet these emerging perspectives on environmental issues is explored. The results in this thesis show that in practice the potential of the development permission process to include the emerging perspectives on environmental issues for this process has been rather low in the past, since the environmental assessments reports submitted with the applications for development permission focus to a large extent on local and technical issues. This means that environmentally relevant issues such as global and long-term impacts and resource management issues tend to have been disregarded. However, studies of more recently made assessment reports reveal that such ssues are beginning to emerge to some extent. Furthermore, the public adds to the potential for this decision-making process, as it tends to discuss the project from a systems perspective as well. The thesis further suggests that the institutional context of the decision-making process impedes the potential to include the emerging perspectives in some respects. For example, present legislative rules and guidelines do not include the new perspectives on environmental issues and do not allow decision-making authorities to take such issues into account. The thesis also shows that the local planning processes do not have the potential - in practice - to include environmental issues from wide perspectives. The local plans tend to focus on environmental issues from a local and technical perspective and do only to some extent include wider perspectives. It is further indicated that the interests and power of the actors within the planning processes are important factors influencing which perspectives are applied when the plan is made. To increase the potential for the local planning process to meet the demands for wider perspectives on environmental issues, the thesis therefore suggests that it is important to raise the status of local energy and waste management plans so they can have an actual impact on the development of the local technical systems. Finally, in order to increase the potential for both of the two formal decision-making processes studied in this thesis, linking the two decision-making processes would enable local planners, project developers and decision-making authorities to address impacts from a wider perspective. Linking the two processes would leave only local and project-oriented environmental issues to be discussed within the project development permission process, and the local planning process could focus on the environmental impacts of a local energy system and proposed energy projects from wider perspectives. The two processes would therefore be able to take all environmental issues relevant from a systems perspective into account.

<p>This report asks the question how to balance thepreservation of cultural built heritage against other publicand private interests in local planning. The aim of the studyis to contribute to knowledge about how different actors valuethe built heritage and how they interact in planning. The studydiscusses how this knowledge can be taken into account inplanning practice. As society develops further into a knowledgesociety, the valuation of local environmental qualities seemsto be more complex than during previous decades. For thatreason the maintenance of cultural built heritage is moredifficult to handle than before. The planning process has bytradition been characterised by a strong public sectorinvolvement and by strict procedural links to the regulationsystem. However, private initiatives have come to play anincreasingly important role in the planning process. Thesechanges have led to a situation where decision-making becomesinformal. The question is if planning functions in such waythat all values represented by different interests areconsidered carefully when decisions are made for preservation,renewal or change of the builtenvironment. There are reasonsto question the notion of citizen representation by localpoliticians and experts of various kinds. The theoreticalfoundation for the study is economic valuation theory, andespecially environmental economics, in combination withnegotiation theory and planning theory. These theories are usedas a starting point for an analysis of different actors’understanding of the cultural built heritage, their incentivesfor participating in planning, and, hence, for understandingthe interaction which determines preservation practice.Empirical findings are based on a case study of planning andheritage management in the municipality of Umeå. Itincludes studies of five recently completed planning processesconcerning specific real estate properties, as well as, aquestionnaire directed to a random selection of 1000inhabitants in the municipality. The study concludes that theoutcome of planning to a substantial part is depending of theinteraction and relations between the stakeholders, and, hence,structured by what has developed as the intellectual traditionand context of the city. The study shows that the builtenvironment seen as a public good in general is not fullyacknowledged and understood. Consequently, the private goodcharacteristic of the built environment is stressed inplanning, not only by private actors, but also by the publicsector. Furthermore, the study concludes that one importantissue in the management of the cultural built heritage is todraw on the actors’incentives for preservation, hence,paying more attention to the question of future direct andindirect use of the built heritage. An actor who primarilyfocuses on existence value runs the risk of being situated inthe margin of planning, with no real influence on decisionsconcerning heritage management.</p>

Climate change is a global problem that will have local impacts on regions and municipalities. Many parts of Canada are already experiencing severe weather events such as extreme levels of rainfall, severe flooding, and increased frequency of storms. Local planning officials have the capacity to respond to climate change through mitigation and adaptation strategies, but before asking the question of whether any action is being taken on the local level, there needs to be an understanding of how local planning officials view climate change and whether the issue reaches policy attention. For the general public, literature tells us that most people perceive climate change to be a temporally and geographically distant issue. This absence of personal relevance renders that people fail to take responsive action. Some authors have also noted that there is an absence of municipal action on climate change because it is also not viewed as a local concern. At the same time, climate change is but one of the many issues that municipal councils must consider and address on a daily basis, often leaving the matter to be pushed aside, in place of other more pressing issues. The main objectives of this thesis were to understand how local planning officials view climate change, assess whether climate change is recognized as an issue requiring policy attention, and perform a policy review to assess the current state of local action in the Regional Municipality of Waterloo. In total, 21 professionals working in the Region took part in the study, and came from a diverse range of backgrounds including planning, environment, emergency management, public health and economic development, among others. With respect to the main research question, ???what is the relationship between climate change risk perceptions and implementation of climate-related policies???, this study found there to be four guiding frameworks. These were 1) the need for collaboration: perceptions indicated a need, while policy demonstrated feasibility; 2) the need for leadership: perceptions suggested that leadership is critical, but somewhat limited in practice, while policy suggested it already exists; 3) the need for integration of climate change in the planning context and other planning issues: perceptions suggested disconnect, while policy also suggested disconnect; and 4) the need for presenting climate change as a local issue: perceptions demonstrated a need, while policy can provide the supporting document.

The world is facing energy supply challenges. Rising prices and finite reserves of fossil fuels, combined with necessary reductions in their use in order to mitigate anthropogenic climate change, will dramatically reshape the future energy supply. Among the greatest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions are the energy systems that power transportation, heating and cooling, and industrial processes. It is imperative that energy planning is sustainable, secure and effectively implemented for local development. The aim of our research is to enhance the planning process that can aid authorities moving towards sustainable local energy systems. Local energy systems refer to the supply, distribution and use of energy within a municipality. In this study, we advocate applying a strategic sustainable development framework based on 'backcasting from principles of sustainability'. We analyzed global, European Union and Swedish energy objectives, as well as the results of a survey of beacon European cities to inform strategic planning guidelines for authorities moving towards sustainable local energy systems. Our research suggests that the strategic sustainable development framework provides structure to inform strategic and critical decision points for planning and implementing local energy systems.

This thesis addresses local adaptation to climate change-induced sea level rise, taking an ethical perspective and focusing at the role of planning and the planner. The research, which has been conducted within a transdisciplinary research project, takes a bottom-up approach to applied ethics, and relies to a great extent on empirical data. In doing this, it contributes to the growing field of ethics of climate change adaptation, with results that can be of interest to both ethicists and planners. The thesis consists of an introductory chapter and three articles.  Article 1: Departing from an interview study with planners working with adaptation to sea level rise in Sweden, a typology of ethical issues is presented. It is shown that planners have to deal with input-oriented, process-oriented, and outcome-oriented ethical issues, and that knowledge of these can contribute to ethical adaptation policy.  Article 2: A method building on Value Sensitive Design (VSD) and scenario planning is developed and applied to address the challenge of integrating ethics when planning for uncertainty over long time- horizons, in the context of adaptation to sea level rise. The method consists of three steps for scenario development and three steps for value investigations. The application resulted in insights on aspects important for an ethical long-term adaptation to sea-level rise.  Article 3: Responsibility of adaptation to sea level rise is often assigned to local planners. But what does it mean to be responsible? Departing from the idea of professional virtues, three codes of ethics for planners are analysed to extract aspirational characteristics for planners. The identified virtues are put in relation to central challenges of adaptation, where five virtues stand out as central to the understanding of what it means to be responsible in adaptation to sea level rise. / Den har avhandlingen behandlar etiska aspekter i anpassning till stigan­de havsnivåer. Som en följd av klimatforändringarna stiger havsnivåer­na, vilket utsätter kustnära samhällen for stora risker. För att minimera dessa risker kan vi antingen minska våra utslapp och begransa klimatförändringarna (detta kallas på engelska for mitigation), eller så kan vi anpassa oss till förandringarna vi star inför. Anpassning till stigande hav­snivåer kan bland annat ta form av hårda skydd som murar mot havet, ekosystembaserade skydd som mangroveskogar, eller genom att flytta samhällen och människor från riskzoner, en sa kallad planerad reträtt. Det som är karakteristiskt för anpassning till stigande havsnivåer är att det i stor utsträckning handlar om ingrepp i den byggda miljön, vilket gör att anpassning till stigande havsnivåer på många sätt kan betraktas som en sorts fysisk planering. I de flesta samhällen kommer anpassning innebära en kombina­tion av insatser, och när anpassningsstrategier formuleras kommer det behövas tas hänsyn till mål- och värdekonflikter. I och med detta kan an­passning till klimatförandringarna och till stigande havsnivåer uppfattas som etisk till sin natur. En etisk analys kan bidra med att systematisera rätt och fel och bistå med verktyg for att fatta välmotiverade beslut. Trots detta har förhallandevis lite forskning inriktat sig på just etisk an­passning till stigande havsnivåer. Denna avhandling bidrar med etiska analyser av anpassning till stigande havsnivåer, med särskild inrikt­ning på lokal anpassning och planerarens roll i anpassningsprocessen. Forskningen som presenteras har genomförts inom det tvärvetenskapli­ga forskningsprojektet Sea-rims (Sustainable and ethical adaptation to rising mean sea levels) som drivs av filosofiska avdelningen på KTH till­sammans med Statens Geotekniska Institut (SGI). Projektgruppen har tillsammans med ett antal projektpartners från sydsvenska kommuner och länsstyrelser, samt en referensgrupp med representanter från myn­digheter som arbetar med anpassning till stigande havsnivåer, utforskat etiska dimensioner av de problem som projektmedlemmarna står infor. Avhandlingen kan därmed ses som ett exempel på tillampad etik, med ett tydligt nedifrån-perspektiv på de etiska frågeställningarna. / <p>QC 210519</p>