Category: News

he Retrofit 2050 project is currently looking for a Research Assistant to join the Cambridge team. Working as part of an interdisciplinary team, the successful candidate will contribute to the integration of a set of novel socio-technical scenarios and technology roadmaps in order to explore prospective urban transitions to sustainability at a city-regional scale. Their work will be particularly focussed on communication and dissemination of research findings and will involve effective engagement with key stakeholders.

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On Thursday 16th February, the Guardian online will be hosting an interactive online discussion to consider key questions about the sustainable city of the future with Tim Dixon, leader of the Technology Foresight package of the project, as part of a panel of experts. Key issues for debate include:

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The second workshop of the Retrofit 2050 visioning process was held in London on 26th January. Bringing together the project’s Urban Foresight Panel, the workshop aimed to imagine, describe and appraise visions of the sustainable city in 2050, developing existing visions to explore what it would be like to live, work and govern in them. This visioning exercise was the first step in a backcasting process intended to identify the key issues for retrofitting UK city-regions between 2020 and 2050.

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RICS has launched an essay competition for its student members as part of the Vision for Cities research programme, examining key thinking on the provision of sustainable cities to 2030 and beyond. The competition aims to promote and showcase innovative thinking on the future of sustainable development in world cities.

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CLUES Conference: Energy in the Locality

A day-conference to explore local energy case studies in urban and rural locations.

8th May 2012, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1

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What is the most effective and efficient way to decarbonise a city? There are thousands of low carbon options available and, although they present a significant opportunity to reduce energy bills and carbon footprints, there is often a lack of reliable information on their performance. The higher levels of risk and uncertainty that emerge as a result of this lack of this deficit can act as major barriers to action, making it hard to develop a political, business or social case for investment in low carbon options.

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JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) has organised a launch of several new BETA products and tools centred around geospatial technology and aimed at Universities, Colleges and Schools. Come along and experiment with these soon-to-be-released products at a special one day event on Monday November 28th at Ravensborough College (next door to the Milennium Dome) in London.

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The RETROFIT 2050 Urban Foresight Panel – a group of leading experts from industry, academia, government and civil society organisations – met at the Royal Society, London on October 6th 2011 for the first of three participatory scenario workshops. The workshop process will produce a set of contextual scenarios for the systemic urban retrofitting of core UK city regions. These scenarios will then be tested and evaluated through the project’s detailed modelling and case-study research in Greater Manchester and Cardiff/SE Wales.

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The new RETROFIT 2050 website is a portal to information about what we’re doing and why it’s important. Very much a work in progress, it will continue to be updated with new resources, including promotional materials explaining the work of the project and publications and working papers around the subject of retrofitting our two case study regions.

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