Urban energy transitions through innovations in green building

Recent debates on climate change have increasingly focused on cities as a strategic spatial scale to implementss climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies. Within this context, green building and the way the built environment interfaces with urban structures and services have become significant levers of action for cities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and become climate change leaders (Bulkeley et al., 2011). Approximately 30% to 40% of final energy consumption is linked to buildings and, as a consequence, the building sector has been identified as one of the most relevant sectors to reduce CObuilding is largely associated with technological innovations, building design and the way elements are embedded within the overall urban fabric, a shift towards green building in cities largely depends on modes of sustainable governance. Relevant dimensions include support of and for green policies and incentives, institutional support through resource centres, think tanks, certification bodies, and training, aspects of inclusivity both in the planning process as well as the later use of (and access to) buildings and to a considerable extent on lived sustainability (i.e. the ways individuals interact with and use buildings). This latter dimension of possibly changing user behaviour and consumer lifestyles seems to be absent from most of the energy scenario studies, as Samadi et al. (2016) revealed in their assessment of a series of internationally influential studies and policy programmes. Like other scholars (e.g. Sachs, 1999; Princen, 2003; Schneidewind & Zahrnt, 2014), they plead for a stronger conceptualization of sufficiency oriented policy approaches and differentiate persuasive instruments (e.g. through education and communication) from incentive based (price/tax policies) and more coercive approaches (limits, bans)