EU-China workshop



EU-China workshop

Towards Innovative Joint Solutions for Common Urbanisation Challenges

Foshan China 30-31 May 2013

EU - China joint RECOMMENDATIONS

EU-China workshop "Towards Innovative Joint Solutions for Common Urbanisation Challenges" EU - China joint RECOMMENDATIONS

| |Topics |Mechanism |Actors |Specific framework conditions to |

| | | |EU/CN |improve |

|Sustainable development |Urban governance and institutional innovation including the issues of land use, |Twinning, networking, exchange of |COM. DG RTD |Definition of concepts |

|and urban planning |public services and infrastructures, in particular: |experiences |JPI Urban Europe |Improved reciprocal knowledge on |

| |Better understanding of urbanisation-related laws and issues (relations between |Joint research and innovation |NDRC |urbanisation processes |

| |different levels of administration) |projects |Ministry of Housing, Urban and rural | |

| |Research on urban community planning |Establishment of living labs |development | |

| |Innovative development strategies for urbanisation |Exchange of staff at local level |Ministry of Agriculture | |

| |Sustainable coordinated development of urban and rural areas |Establishing EU-China Joint Research |MOST | |

| |Research on planning for low-efficiency and idle land for sustainable urban |Institute |Cities and regions | |

| |development | |One or two universities on each side of| |

| |Financing city development, public services and innovation, including platforms | |EU and China | |

| |for infrastructures/investment; in particular the innovative research on urban | | | |

| |financing modalities based upon the needs of new urbanisation development | | | |

| |Placing people at the centre of urban development: human-centred planning, in | | | |

| |particular: | | | |

| |NGOs, mechanisms for public participation and social engagement | | | |

| |Research on sustainable urbanisation evaluation indicators' system | | | |

| |The environmental dimension of sustainability, in particular: | | | |

| |New evaluation systems guiding development towards sustainable urbanisation | | | |

| |(indicators, tools) | | | |

| |Comparison study with an innovative perspective (current problems, global | | | |

| |challenges) | | | |

| | | | | |

| |Relevant studies on integration of agricultural migrant population into cities | | | |

| |Research on the Hukou residence registration system reform that promotes | | | |

| |integration of agricultural population into cities | | | |

| |Research on the land system reform that promotes integration of agricultural | | | |

| |population into cities | | | |

| |Research on planning that promotes integration of agricultural population into | | | |

| |cities | | | |

| |Research on public participation that promotes integration of agricultural | | | |

| |population into cities | | | |

| |Research on the adaptability of agricultural population's integration into cities| | | |

| | | | | |

|Green urban mobility and |Vehicles ( zero emission vehicle, eg. buses taxis, city delivery vehicles) |Matching programmes, |COM. DG RTD / DG MOVE, |Joint standards for energy storage,|

|transport |Network management (multimodal modelling, monitoring and decision support; |Demonstration projects |NDRC |recharging infrastructure |

| |eco-driving) ) |Extension of on-going projects |Ministry of Science and Technology |multimodal journey planning, |

| |Sustainable urban mobility plans |Establishing EU-China Joint Research |Ministry of Transport |ticketing across country borders… |

| |Green mobility planning research on the basis of urban function analysis |Institute |Viajeo , Solutions projects |Overcome specific barriers in the |

| |Studies on the experiences of the green urban mobility pilots | |Regions and cities |rules of participation in funding |

| | | |One or two universities on each side of|programmes |

| | | |EU and China | |

|Sustainable energy |exchange of urbanisation related data; |Twinning, networking, exchange of |COM. DG RTD / DG ENER |Different standards, indicators |

|Solutions for Cities |developing common indicator systems; |experiences between existing projects|EERA Smart Cities JP |Difficulty for European companies |

| |exchanging experiences concerning existing smart (or eco-) city demonstration |/ demos |EERA Smart Grid JP |to access Chinese public |

| |projects; |Establishing EU-China Joint Research |Renewable Heating and Cooling Platform |procurement procedures |

| |exploring cooperation opportunities with China on the basis of the research |Institute |(RHC) |Many Chinese authorities in charge |

| |agendas of RHC and the E2BA; | |Energy Efficient Buildings Association |of decision-making |

| |elaborating models for comparing different EE investment alternatives; | |(E2BA) | |

| |designing cost-effective retro-fitting strategies; | |NDRC | |

| |contribution to Chinese demonstration projects. | |MOST | |

| |Research on smart energy for cities | |Selected Chinese cities | |

| | | |Urban Planning and Design Institute of | |

| | | |Nanjing University (Beijing) | |

| | | |One or two universities on each side of| |

| | | |EU and China | |

EU-China workshop

Towards Innovative Joint Solutions for Common Urbanisation Challenges

EU - China joint RECOMMENDATIONS

1. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND URBAN PLANNING

1.1 potential themes for future research and innovation

• Urban governance and institutional innovation including

the issues of land use, public services and infrastructures

Experiences should be exchanged on the management of urban growth including sprawl, densification, sensitive zones and legal status of land. While doing so, the focus should be on cities within ‘functional regions’ that combines physical planning and governance aspects (land use and environment, transport, energy, social issues)[1].

R&I activities should look into the legal issues and processes connected with urbanisation: a better understanding of urbanisation-related laws and issues is needed as well as new development strategies in this area (including the relations between different levels of administration). In this regard, European experiences on the management of land use and related models, laws and regulations could be shared with China, and for Europe, it would be interesting to learn from the Chinese experience on boosting dynamic regional economies. R&I should focus on the specificities of small and medium-sized cities. Experiences could be exchanged on how to plan urban infrastructures and public services in a balanced, integrated and accessible manner, and while doing so, take into account potential lock-in effects and sustainability principles.

Research on urban community planning

Research on planning for low-efficiency and idle land for sustainable urban development

The issue of how to bring about a sustainable model of city financing should be jointly studied, including the issue of financing platforms for infrastructures and innovation. In particular, the EU experience on the collection and transfer of property taxes as well as existing systems, models and databases regarding intelligent green mobility infrastructures are of interest to the Chinese. Similarly, for Europe, it would be interesting to learn from the Chinese experience on developing comprehensive solutions to mobility[2]. Innovative research on urban financing modalities based upon the needs of new urbanisation development, and research on sustainable urbanisation evaluation indicators' system shall be carried out.

The role and impact of local governments on the development of the local economy (including legal issues) is an interesting area for R&I. Experiences on sustainable rural-urban land use relationships should be shared[3], and R&I activities could focus on the intensification of land use in a coordinated manner between urban and rural areas as well as on food security, including the issue of metropolitan food planning.

• Placing people at the centre of urban development:

Human-centred planning

• Relevant studies on integration of agricultural migrant population into cities

Research on the Hukou residence registration system reform that promotes integration of agricultural population into cities

Research on the land system reform that promotes integration of agricultural population into cities

Research on planning that promotes integration of agricultural population into cities

Research on public participation that promotes integration of agricultural population into cities

Research on the adaptability of agricultural population's integration into cities

R&I activities should look into socially cohesive and inclusive urban development practices. Good practices should be shared on the management of migration flows and integration of diverse social groups in city neighbourhoods. R&I activities could focus on locally induced and socially innovative development initiatives. Experiences on how to involve the civil society (NGOs) in urban development practices could be shared, in particular, in view of how to develop mechanisms for public participation and social engagement. Cultural heritage and preservation of architectural assets and identities feature amongst the important R&I topics.

The environmental dimension of sustainability

R&I activities should focus on urban resilience with a view to investigating why some cities are resilient and some others vulnerable and how the adaptive capacity of cities can be improved. Experiences should be shared on the scarcity of resources and how to improve resource efficiency (e.g. water, energy). The issue of setting up circular economic systems in a sustainable way should be explored; in particular, urban water recycling could be an interesting topic. R&I should address the development of ‘Ecologically Sustainable and Economically Viable Cities’ (ECO2) including the issues of low-carbon economy, renewables and eco-innovation. In this context, experiences could also be shared on resource recycling such as use of sewage and garbage as biomass resources. An important area for R&I activities is urban air quality that should be perceived both as an area for mitigation and opportunity for innovation. Finally, both the EU and China share the same need for the new evaluation systems guiding the development towards sustainable urbanisation: R&I should focus on the improvement, use and applicability of indicators measuring sustainable development of cities.

Furthermore, a comparison study with an innovative perspective between the EU and China would be particularly significant. Based on such a study, both Europe and China could share knowledge of current urban development problems and challenges existing between them or globally.

1.2. recommendations in relation to

framework conditions in research and innovation[4]

• Meaning of the concepts is a challenge for R&I cooperation. In order to avoid ambiguities, it is necessary to establish a common understanding of some core concepts related to sustainable development and urban planning. Furthermore, despite the on-going and/or completed R&I activities [5], it is evident that there is a need to improve reciprocal knowledge on urbanisation processes between the EU and China.

• Diversities between the EU and China pose a challenge for R&I cooperation. For example, the magnitude of urbanisation and rapid pace of change in China differs significantly from the current development in Europe. Consequently, Europe and China have adopted different approaches to urban planning and historical and cultural differences also exist between the two sides.

1.3. recommendations in relation to activities and support mechanisms

Both the EU and China have built a significant knowledge base on sustainable development and urban planning, and in the short-term, activities aimed at twinning, networking and exchanging experiences (e.g. workshops, seminars, visits to universities, research organisations, cities, science and innovation parks, living labs and incubators...) should be developed between the main actors from the both sides. Funding for such networking activities could be raised from different instruments promoting EU-China collaboration.

In the short to medium term, funding for R&I cooperation (flagship projects) is to be explored in relation to Horizon 2020, national programmes in the EU Member States, as well as in relation to national programmes in China.

With regard to Horizon 2020, the R&I themes identified above could be supported under different Societal Challenges of Horizon 2020, for example, the Societal Challenges on "Climate action, resource efficiency and raw materials"; "Europe in a changing world: inclusive, innovative and reflective societies"; "Secure, clean and efficient energy"; "European bioeconomy challenges: food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine and maritime and inland water research".

With regard to the research Joint Programming Initiative (JPI) Urban Europe[6], the JPI has an interest in developing R&I cooperation with the Chinese side in the following themes[7]:

• Comparative studies to develop a common baseline for joint efforts, e.g. linked to the recently completed Urban Europe megatrend study: human-centred, integrated urban planning; social inclusion; sustainability; role of cities for regional development;

• Issues of urban governance: densification; policies supporting concentration; development of small and medium-sized cities; integrated models for urban and rural development and interaction; roles and contributions of national, regional and local authorities for urban development;

• Urban scenarios, indicators & tools: evaluation of indicators for sustainable cities;

• Sustainable urban development: water management, incl. recycling; sustainable services for small cities and towns (water, waste, etc.); social inclusion (reform of the Hukou system); intensive land use (industrial and residential areas; resource efficiency);

• Urban infrastructure and services: innovative models for urban investments; integrated approaches for urban (infrastructure) planning; low carbon infrastructure and systems; efficient public transportation and multi-modal mobility; public services.

One specific R&I activity could be the establishment of ‘Urban Living Labs’ in China[8]. A living lab is a user-centred, open-innovation ecosystem, often operating in a territorial context (e.g. city, agglomeration, region), integrating concurrent research and innovation processes within a public-private-people partnership. It is an R&I concept that promotes interdisciplinary co-creation, exploration, experimentation as well as evaluation, and it thus provides test beds for demonstration in a broad spectrum of areas.

2. Green Urban mobility and Transport

2 .1 POTENTIAL themes for future research and innovation

(Focus on common interest, e.g. local air quality and fighting climate change) that could be endorsed at the first meeting of the EU-China High Level Dialogue on Innovation.

• Zero emission vehicles

Exchange of experience with demonstration of (near to) zero emission vehicles. This seems to be the most promising with owners of fleets like buses (airport operators, city centres), taxi's and vehicles for city delivery operators[9]. Accompanying research should look into behavioural aspects, into business models and into technological aspects if and when needed (such as standards for energy storage and recharging infrastructure).

• Network management

In network management the importance of traffic related pollution has been recognised (the challenge), together with the need for modelling, monitoring and decision support. With regard to the end-user it is recommended for accompanying research into eco-driving (behaviour), standards for information exchange (technology) and large scale market uptake (business models). Standardisation is recognised as a key enabler, for instance for multimodal journey planning, (public) transport ticketing across country borders and other areas.

• Sustainable urban mobility plans

Sustainable urban mobility plans enable public authorities to make better informed choices in planning, managing, maintaining and innovating urban transport systems. Companies and employers in the private sector can play a major role in offering incentives for sustainable mobility behaviour. The users of the transport system are free to choose the preferred mode of transport, but should not be punished for sustainable mobility behaviour. One example given here was the person on the bicycle suffering from bad local air and the user of a polluting car enjoying filtered air from the in-car air conditioning system.

Implementing sustainable urban mobility in EU-China cooperation is recommended at both the level of central and local government in a combined approach of bottom-up and top-down. On the local level there is the risk of a mismatch between major cities or even mega-cities in China and the city model that is predominant in Europe. It is recommended to look into the functional characteristics of medium seized cities and the identification of common challenges in the transport sector. Research on green mobility planning on the basis of urban function analysis and studies on the experiences of the green urban mobility pilots shall be carried out.

2. RECOMMENDATIONS IN RELATION TO framework conditions for market uptake

• When looking into the business models for the market uptake of innovations it is recommended also to look into the framework conditions for the specific case in a systemic way, including the procedure for final decision making.

• When looking into technologies the development of joint standards for energy storage and recharging infrastructure and for multimodal journey planning as well as (public) transport ticketing across country borders have been mentioned here before.

2.3 recommendations in relation to activities and support mechanisms

Further to these content related recommendations there were clear recommendations in relation to support mechanisms: matching programmes (money, source and instrument) and conditions for cooperation and participation (focus on equal partnership and mutual benefit).

• With regard to Horizon 2020

New opportunities for effective and efficient cooperation are to be explored in relation to Horizon 2020 and national programmes (EU-side) and programmes such as 863, 973 and other relevant programmes (China-side).

It is recommended that specific barriers in the rules for participation be overcome. As an example, it was mentioned that Horizon 2020 is open to participation from the Chinese side and that this openness is not (yet) matched by similar opportunities for participation by a European partner in a Chinese programme.

• With regards to existing and running projects: ViajeoPLUS and SOLUTIONS

Opportunities for interrelating running demonstrations in the EU and China are to be further explored in the projects ViajeoPLUS and SOLUTIONS, depending upon the willingness of the partners of the specific demonstration projects involved. The aim is to work on the transferability of innovative solutions on the basis of equal partnership and mutual benefit. It is recommended to use the methodologies as developed for selecting the 100 smart cities in China, and methodologies for mutual learning and cooperation as practised in, for instance, the CIVITAS framework in Europe.

3. SUSTAINABLE Energy Solutions for Cities

3.1 POTENTIAL themes for future research and innovation

The ‘energy session’ was broken down into four topics: integrated urban planning, energy efficiency of buildings, integration of renewables and best practices.

• integrated urban energy planning

Chinese speakers presented a clear analysis of the challenges their country is facing: urban planning cannot keep pace with the pace of urbanisation; the paradoxical relation between the need for economic growth to ensure better life for citizens, and the consequent pollution and environmental impact that negatively affects the quality of life; huge geographical size and regional differences; enormous costs of transition from traditional to renewable sources of energy; lack of a uniform set of indicators and data due to different public authorities in charge; structural obstacles to develop public-private business models to share costs of investment.

European speakers stressed that the EU’s size, complexity and socio-economic variability was comparable to those of China, and consequently no single set of measures or technologies could answer Europe’s own urbanisation challenges. EERA speakers underlined the importance of creating interfaces between the energy system, users, buildings and the environment in order to enable demand-response and interactivity. To optimize the use of resources, the different technological, socio-economic, and behavioural and climate elements have to be integrated in the urban energy planning process. Links must also be created between the different networks (heat, cold, electricity, gaseous), in order to optimise energy use.

• Energy efficiency

As far as the energy efficiency of buildings is concerned, the size of the Chinese construction market may offer business opportunities, but investment costs, the lack of suitable business models, different standards and restricted public procurement procedures creates significant barriers for improvement.

The European side stressed the role of policy-makers in providing incentives which make the EE solutions the most attractive option for consumers. Concerning the specific issue of ‘Energy performance contracts’, which fell short of the expected scaling-up effect in China, the European ‘franchise model’ was briefly presented, which takes into account of the energy consumption model and consumers’ building type.

The Energy Efficient Buildings Association (E2BA) and the Renewable Heating and Cooling Platform (RHC) were presented as a European example for involving industrial stakeholders in policy target setting, implementation and financing.

Introducing different timeframes for different energy efficiency measures was put forward as a potential way of distributing investment costs in time and dealing with scale and speed of the urbanisation challenge: in the short term, measures for reducing energy consumption are less costly than installing new technologies and can provide immediate impact; district development and retrofitting may be solutions in the longer run. Increasing the scale of investment from buildings to districts was proposed to decrease the unit costs of deploying advanced heating and cooling technologies.

• Integrating renewables into the grid

Concerning the deployment of renewable technologies in cities, it was emphasised that the energy solutions are available on the market, but their cost vis-à-vis the traditional energy sources creates financial barriers, while the penetration of variable energy source into the grid creates operational uncertainties. The differences among regions in availability of renewable energy resources add to the difficulties of implementation. A smart city agenda cannot succeed therefore without tailor-made deployment strategies, the support of power storage technologies, the most advanced level control rooms and highly qualified operators.

• Research on smart energy for cities

• Best practices of implementation

Finally two European best practices were presented. The Urumqi demo zone of the EU-China Clean Energy Centre provided an example of EU-China cooperation in the field, notably how European know-how and technology can contribute to the making and implementation of regeneration policy in a remote region of China. On the other hand, the European Energy Research Alliance, a Europe-wide network and research programme of leading laboratories and universities, was presented as a single entry point for Chinese stakeholders to European research excellence on smart cities.

The Chinese side concluded that while having a clear understanding of the existing problems, and many good examples of eco-districts or demo sites, there was uncertainty on how to address the problems on the large scale. Therefore they expressed interest in learning more on European experiences in policy-making and urban energy planning; in developing common indicators, which could make EU and Chinese data comparable; in collaborating on best practices of integrating renewable energy resources into the grid; in obtaining information on available energy and environmental technology solutions from state-of-the-art technologies to the “affordable” ones; in developing alternative solutions for increasing energy efficiency; in planning business models, which would make innovations work, e.g., EPCs adapted to Chinese economic and social environment.

The European side concluded that cooperation with China offers plenty of opportunities and mutual benefits both for the research community and the industry, from socio-economic research to collaboration on demo projects. In particular the following areas were mentioned: exchange of urbanisation related data; developing common indicator systems; exchanging experiences concerning existing smart (or eco-) city demonstration projects (e.g. demo sites in European harbour cities or the eco-zone in Guizhou City, China); exploring cooperation opportunities on specific research areas identified by the RHC and the E2BA; elaborating models for comparing different EE investment alternatives; designing cost-effective retro-fitting strategies; contribution to Chinese demonstration projects.

3.2 recommendations in relation to activities and support mechanisms

• Cooperation area(s) with short-term implementation potential

“Twinning”, i.e., exchange of experiences and results between EU and Chinese demonstration projects with the aim of exchanging data and experiences, developing common indicators and improving modelling tools has been identified as the pragmatic and mutually beneficial way of following up on the outcomes of the Foshan workshop.

The Commission supports continuing cooperation on sustainable urban energy solutions at different levels and on different topics between European stakeholders, with special regard to the Smart Cities Joint Programme of the European Energy Research Alliance and relevant Chinese entities. The adequate support mechanisms will need further examination.

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[1] The developments in the City of Foshan regarding integration of industry, city and population could be shared between the EU and China.

[2] The experience of the City of Guangzhou on the development of green roads and public bicycles could provide an empirical case for knowledge exchange.

[3] The urban and rural planning and development experience of the City of Chengdu could provide a good practice for sharing with the EU that has funded a large-scale FP6 PLUREL project on the topic (the report is available at Default.aspx?id=113).

[4] Framework conditions: ( )

The external arena within which firms can manoeuvre and change, and which thus surrounds innovation activities at the firm level (the innovation dynamo), comprises institutions and conditions which have mostly been established (or have developed) for reasons unconnected to innovation. These factors determine the broad parameters within which firms exist and carry out their business. They therefore have substantial effects on business innovation. This general institutional environment provides the framework conditions within which innovation can occur.

The component elements include:

• The basic educational system for the general population, which determines minimum educational standards in the workforce and the domestic consumer market;

• The communications infrastructure, including roads, telephones and electronic communication;

• Financial institutions determining, for example, the ease of access to venture capital;

• Legislative and macro-economic settings such as patent law, taxation, corporate governance rules and policies relating to interest and exchange rates, tariffs and competition;

• Market accessibility, including possibilities for the establishment of close relations with customers as well as matters such as size and ease of access;

• Industry structure and the competitive environment, including the existence of supplier firms in complementary industry sectors.

[5] UrbaChina is the EU- FP7 Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities-funded project which analyses China’s urbanisation trends for the next 40 years and defines possible future scenarios with reference to sustainability ()

[6] The JPI Urban Europe is an EU Member States-led initiative that coordinates urban-related R&I programmes in Europe and is in a the process of compiling a Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda for joint R&I Calls for Proposals (jpi-urbaneurope.eu).

[7] Exact topics for R&I collaboration between the JPI Urban Europe and the Chinese side to be defined by continuing dialogue with NDRC/CCUD China Centre for Urban Development

[8] The JPI Urban Europe has experience of Living Lab approaches as part of its first Calls for Proposals and is interested in sharing the experience with China.

[9] During a videoconference on 20 June 2013 the Chinese side expressed the wish also to look into research and innovation about privately owned (near to) zero emission vehicles.

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