Beating the Heat: Accelerating Access to Sustainable Climate Solutions in Cities: Implementation Lab

13:30 – 16:30 (EET)

This thematic session will explore opportunities for cities to accelerate access to sustainable climate solutions and will present best practices from around the world, with a focus on solutions to beat the rising heat with green, sustainable and inclusive approaches. The event will introduce the Nature for Cool Cities Challenge, showcase new findings from RMI on how urban nature can save cities energy and carbon, and share cities’ latest on-the-ground experience with sustainable urban cooling solutions.

Our cities are getting hotter. Today, 56% of the world’s population – 4.4 billion inhabitants – live in cities, and 1.4 billion of these people already face high climate risks. By 2100, cities across the world could warm by 4.4°C, exposing the world’s growing urban population to conditions that will damage human health, productivity, and quality of life. Luckily, we have sustainable urban cooling solutions to increase resilience to climate risks and ensure equitable, while ensuring we create more sustainable urban futures. To ensure climate resilience and protect our natural world, cities must take a comprehensive, whole-systems approach to cool down and adapt – without warming the planet. Urban nature can help reduce temperatures, protect city dwellers and increase their thermal comfort, while supporting energy demand reduction, reduced air and water pollution, and increased health and wellbeing. Nature-based solutions can be brought to scale through increased awareness of their benefits among decision makers, enabling policies, effective investments and financing, and tailoring best practices to local contexts.