TABLE OF CONTENTS - The Professional Green Building Council

Theme B: Creating a livable, healthy and environmentally viable citiesIn figure 5, we see that Beijing ecological footprint per inhabitant is getting closethat of Tokyo and that shanghai ecological footprint is already in between thesituation of European and American citiesEnergy consumption per inhabitant is almost double in Shanghai than in Paris(2.16 kilotons equivalent oil/year in Shanghai against 1.28 in Paris). This is partlydue to the structure of economic activity (primary industry in Shanghai andservices economy in Paris and London) but also to the huge differences in urbanmorphologies (urban sprawl in Shanghai compared to a density 6 times higher inthe centre of Paris than in Shanghai).As the GDP per inhabitant is 8 times lower in Shanghai than in Paris, the result isan ecological efficiency 8 times lower in Shanghai than in Paris and energyefficiency 16 times lower in Shanghai than in Paris. In other terms, it requires 8times more biological resources and 16 times more energy to produce a unit ofGDP in Shanghai than in Paris. In this huge efficiency difference, urbanmorphology at various scales accounts for a big part.3.3 Is Shanghai a sustainable Model for China?If the 500 Chinese urban dwellers of today had the same consumption patterns andthe same ecological footprints as the Shanghai citizens, China would have today a2.6 billion global ha footprint deficit, and would need 3 times the biologicalresources of its territory to sustain its urban population. With the rural population,China would need 4 Chinas and about half the planet resources.In 2050, if 1.1 billion Chinese were urbanised according to the current Shanghaimodel with an American type footprint due to the urban sprawl and the increase inliving standards and with an extremely optimistic 10 fold improvement of itssystems efficiency, China would have a 11 billion global ha footprint and wouldneed the resources of more than one planet Earth (8.7 billion global ha). Such ascenario is clearly unsustainable.420