By Philippe Fournand, CEO of Blue-Sight Conseil, ASCEND
Europe's cities are increasingly caught between decarbonisation goals, rising capital needs and a renewed imperative for growth, innovation and energy security.
Over the past decade, a series of systemic shocks has quietly invalidated many of the assumptions on which Europe’s climate and urban policies were built. A global pandemic, a major land war on the continent’s borders, energy supply disruptions and the sudden acceleration of AI have reshaped priorities in ways few foresaw when the Green Deal and the smart cities and communities agenda were conceived.
What was once a policy environment defined by stability, cheap energy and long term climate ambition is now characterised by urgency, constraint and geopolitical risk. As Europe moves from vision to delivery, a harder question is emerging: have our climate and urban strategies evolved fast enough to match this new reality? Nowhere is this tension more visible than in the cities, long positioned as laboratories of the energy transition.
You can read more about the climate ambitions of cities from our ASCEND member, Philippe Fournand via this link.
The article has been posted as part of the ENLIT Europe article series.
