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Low Carbon Laboratories

Low Carbon Laboratories. Built environments as learning machines for sustainability James Evans - Andrew Karvonen. Searching for the DNA of the sustainable city. Arcosanti. Songdo. Masdar. Knowledge and the black boxes of eco-urban governance .

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Low Carbon Laboratories

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  1. Low Carbon Laboratories Built environments as learning machines for sustainability James Evans - Andrew Karvonen

  2. Searching for the DNA of the sustainable city

  3. Arcosanti

  4. Songdo

  5. Masdar

  6. Knowledge and the black boxes of eco-urban governance - Information overload (adaptation and innovation) - Learning (local and global transformation) Experiment Policy revision Data collection and analysis

  7. Low Carbon Laboratories • Learning landscapes in which experiments can be conducted • Highly visible truth spots (Gieryn 2006) • Evidence base for making rapid changes to urban development policies - frames new futures (Callon et al. 2009) • Scaling (McCann and Ward 2011) ‘novel form of innovation where scientific research increasingly erases the received institutional boundaries between science and society’ - Gross 2010, 169 • A microcosm of wider challenges facing eco-cities

  8. “It’s a unique experiment and I think the initial reaction is, well, actually cool” - Lead Researcher, North Desert Village, Phoenix “Its all theory until you build it” -Landscape Architect, Elmer Avenue, Los Angeles “It’s a living laboratory to see how effective trees and grass are at preventing runoff and flash flooding” - Researcher, Oxford Road, Manchester

  9. Practicalities • Access and permission... • Ownership • Authorities

  10. The qualities of learning landscapes • Very clear geographies - bounded spaces • Tight governance, simple ownership

  11. The politics of experimentation “the residents were sort of confused with all that was going on and so that if they were told that is was this landscape experiments and stuff like that, but at one point they were afraid we were going to take all their trees away, so they put up signs and some peace cap, ‘Please do not cut down our trees’...” - Lead Social Scientist, North Desert Village, Phoenix

  12. Risk “[you have to]explain that this is an experiment so if some things don’t work out its ok, so [we should] just get on and do it” - Chief Engineer, Elmer Avenue, Los Angeles “there’s a lot of risk involved… an awful lot of money has gone down the drain trying to set up pilot schemes that weren’t that successful. It’s the price you pay for chasing an innovative approach… -City Council, Oxford Road, Manchester

  13. The local learning loop - materialize the empirical (Marres 2009, 127). “Because [we have] initial findings but since then it’s like ok now what do we do with it” – Researcher, North Desert Village, Phoenix “Only about 1% of meetings end up in meaningful projects” - Project Manager, North Desert Village, Pheonix Is Corridor Manchester going to save the world? Not sure…” - Planner, City Council, Oxford Road Corridor, Manchester The global learning loop

  14. Unpacking the black boxes of eco-urban governance “Governance? I don’t think I’ve ever really thought of that as an experiment” - CEO, Corridor Manchester Partnership • From the governance of experiments to experimental governance?

  15. jp.evans@manchester.ac.uk References Callon, M., P. Lascoumes, and Y. Barthe (2009) Acting in an uncertain world: an essay on technical democracy, translated by Graham Burchell, MIT Press, London. Evans, J. 2011. Resilience, ecology and adaptation in the experimental city. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 36(2): 223-237. Evans, J. & A. Karvonen 2011. Living laboratories for sustainability: exploring the politics and epistemology of urban adaptation. In H. Bulkeley, V. CastánBroto, M. Hodson, and S. Marvin (eds) Cities and Low Carbon Transitions, London: Routledge. Gieryn, T. (2006) City as truth spot. Social Studies of Science 36.1, 5-38. Gross, M. (2010) Hodson M and Marvin S 2009b Cities mediating technological transitions: understanding visions, intermediation and consequences Technology Analysis and Strategic Management 21 515-534 Kohler, R. 2002. Landscapes and Labscapes: Exploring the Lab-field Border in Biology. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Marres, N. (2009) Testing powers of engagement: green living experiments, the ontological turn and the undoability of involvement. European Journal of Social Theory 12.1, 117-133. McCann, E. & K. Ward 2011. Mobile Urbanism: City Policymaking in the Global Age. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

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