Integrated peri-urban areas in the transition towards climate neutrality

Peri-urban areas lie at the periphery of cities. They are the interface between rural and urban environments and are often the subject of high pressure from the urban core which results in an un-controlled and uneven urban expansion towards the rural territory often triggering environmental degradation. While dispersed and heterogenous in terms of land-occupancy, density and services and amenities distribution, the peri-urban territory integrates mutual inter-dependences within the urban-rural continuum. These can be associated with people (inwards and outwards migration or socio-demographic change) as well as with linkages and flows between a variety of rural and urban related functions and activities (ranging from industrial and recycling manufacturing, agriculture production and food processing, sanitation, waste disposal, drinking water provisions, to housing – including slums and gated communities – transport and associated infrastructure, large-scale commercial sites, and large recreational areas such as parks or forests), which juxtapose, collide and mesh in unintended and unplanned ways.

Peri-urban areas are also the subject of weaker governance structures and limited institutional capacity, which in return limits the capacity to regulate economic activities and land-use and land coverage and makes it difficult to implement effective and integrated local, regional, and functional urban area wide policies and programs. This is particularly challenging in areas that straddle multiple jurisdictions, such as urban-rural fringe.

This topic aims to foster the integration of green and smart mobility, energy, industry and governance solutions and measures within the current peri-urban development and planning practice to reduce these areas GHG emissions and to improve their liveability.

Proposals, depending on chosen domains, should investigate a sustainable and decarbonised development of the peri-urban areas by shifting from fossil fuels to sustainable energy sources in mobility, energy or industry domains supported by adequate governance structures and practices based on a sustainable land-use planning and an urban expansion which integrates environmental considerations and determinants. In addition, proposals should provide European demonstration-type examples on how to sustainably integrate climate-neutral, green, and smart solutions and measures into the peri-urban/urban development and the existing transport, energy, and industrial infrastructures, to achieve long-term decarbonization impacts and necessary climate resilience. Activities and pilot demonstrations of technological nature of the proposed solutions in operational environment are expected to be at minimum TRL 7 by the end of the project. Positive, long-term impacts on social cohesion, economic development, and public perception – resulting in behavioural change and policy change – should be fostered and anticipated. Proposals, depending on selected domains should:

• Explore particular characteristics of peri-urban areas that are distinct from rural and urban ones and analyse relevant urban-rural dynamics such as continuous and frequent land-use and functional changes, poor and inaccessible transport infrastructure, scattered and unevenly distributed day-to-day services and amenities.
• Explore models of urban/peri-urban development and planning containing the above-mentioned dynamics (e.g. expansion model, densification model, green-belts and green-corridors model) aimed at overcoming the sustainability, decarbonisation and local climate (e.g. heat islands) challenges of the urban-rural fringe while ensuring co-creation with and engagement of the relevant stakeholders (including citizens and communities).
• Focus on domains that are particularly pertinent in achieving progress in sustainable development, such as:
  • Mobility and transport with extensive use of personal cars with combustion engines, poor and scattered infrastructure, and lack of sustainable transport options. Transport related emissions that are exacerbated by intensive commuter flows generated by peri-urban areas. City focused solutions that are not adapted to peri-urban areas and challenges often exceeding organizational, financial and knowledge capacities of local authorities. Proposals should analyse and explore how peri-urban generated traffic impacts the transport flows (for both goods and people) and its contribution to the total CO2/emissions of the entire urbanized territory.
  • Industry, accounting for 30% of CO2 emissions and often located in peri-urban areas, is capital in succeeding the transition towards a net zero economy. Proposals should analyse the contribution to the total emissions reduction, of improved energy efficiency measures in industrial processes located in peri-urban areas, as well as of the deployment of strategic net-zero technologies, such as solar, (PV and thermal), wind, hydrogen, batteries and storage (incl. thermal energy storage), heat pumps and geothermal energy, electrolysers and fuel cells, biogas/biomethane, carbon capture and storage, and grid technologies, as envisaged in the EU Net Zero Industry Act. Proposals should ramp up and facilitate public-private partnerships, notably the key role of Local Green Deals (LGDs).
  • Circular economy: Peri-urban areas are key for setting up recycling facilities for materials, products and equipment and scaling up material reuse, such as Social Urban Mining and recycling infrastructure across different industries (e.g. online marketplaces to empower exchange for materials, or physical Materials Banks for construction and demolition materials). Proposals should explore, analyse and facilitate the deployment of innovative industrial recycling processes, industrial symbiosis and closed-loop systems, as well as supporting knowledge transfer through innovative practices; piloting local platforms for Social Urban Mining[[ Social Urban Mining – is the concept of creating extended value of demolished buildings by optimizing the deconstruction phase through re-use and high-value recycling. Social Urban Mining creates social added value by integrating social businesses in the operational activities.]]; demonstrating recycling and re-use processes for building and public works materials, industrial waste, water and waste management; enabling material reuse; inducing circular practices, reuse of materials and behavioural change.
  • Vulnerability of peri-urban areas to environmental damage as most of the urban wastes (solid and liquid) and pollutant activities are pushed in the peripheries.
  • Electricity grids and heating/cooling solutions are suboptimal in some peri-urban areas. The often-low energy efficiency and individual fossil fuel or even solid fuel-based heating of the building stock exacerbates energy poverty in the absence of sufficient population density for district heating while the lower real estate prices hamper deep renovation. The opportunities of available space for i.e. clean energy production or electricity and thermal storage are not sufficiently exploited to increase living comfort, accelerate energy transition for the benefit of the local economy and nearby urban areas.
  • Governance, as peri-urban areas can be beyond the legal authority of cities, nor are they considered as part of the rural administrative units. Therefore, the capacity to regulate economic activities (and thus land-use and land coverage) is weak. This results in the peri-urbanization being largely an unplanned process, informal and sometime illegal and often resulting in environmental hazards and degradation of natural resources. This also results in a scattered and uneven distribution of services, amenities, and resources across the peri-urban area. The weaker governance structures complicate also integrated planning and green procurement of energy, transport, and other services.
  • Social and cultural characteristics of peri-urban areas that are gaining on heterogeneity with continuous social dynamics. In many (Central and Eastern) EU cities the peri-urban expansion was driven by the emergence of a stronger middle class. However, in more recent years there has been an increasingly heterogenous mix of occupants/actors with multiple and most often conflicting interests, including settled populations, populations living in gated estates, in-migrants, transient workers, emerging middle-class among others. This overall leads to heterogeneous communities and, in general, to a lack of social cohesion.

The research actions should cover the following:

• Take stock of existing studies, analyse in a structured way, and provide a summary of measures contributing to climate neutrality in European peri-urban areas, identifying barriers.
• Establish co-designing process and engaging with the relevant stakeholders (such as: citizens, local authorities, mobility operators, service providers, energy companies, private businesses…) to ensure a successful uptake of solutions contributing to climate neutrality of peri-urban areas.
• Develop, test, and demonstrate scalable solutions in real life in at least two out of the four domains (Mobility, Energy, Industry, Governance) contributing to climate neutrality of peri-urban areas.

Each proposal should involve stakeholders from at least three ‘lead urban/peri-urban areas’, and at least three ‘replicator’ urban/peri-urban areas. Each urban/peri-urban area should establish a living laboratory where, under real life-conditions, a set of complementary and reinforcing solutions, centred on two to four aspects from the ones presented above (mobility, energy, industry, and governance) should be developed, tested, and implemented in an integrated approach. The participating urban/peri-urban areas, which may have a geographical coverage that goes as far as the full functional urban area, should demonstrate their common interests, and outline how they will ensure a meaningful and close cooperation. The peri-urban areas should each be situated in different EU Member States or countries associated to Horizon Europe. Each proposal should at least include one urban area of the 112 selected ones for the EU Mission on Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities.

To allow for a thorough evaluation of the projects’ outcomes, proposals are expected to provide measurable indicators to demonstrate how the tested solutions are contributing to the climate neutrality objectives of the Climate-neutral and Smart Cities Mission and participating peri-urban areas. These should be supported by clear baselines, quantified targets, and appropriate review processes for each participating urban area. The baselines for the expected outcomes should take into account expected technological developments and policy implementation.

Projects are expected to collaborate with the established and widely applied process and impact evaluation framework (using both clear baselines and measurable impact indicators) as well as the corporate design, the dissemination and information exchange frameworks put in place by the Commission (e.g. the Mission Platform, the CIVITAS initiative, Scalable cities, New European Bauhaus Community, the European Urban Initiative of Cohesion Policy, etc.) and the Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs) of the EIT, such as, for example, EIT Urban Mobility, EIT Culture and Creativity or EIT Food, EU Mission Adaptation to Climate Change, and Driving Urban Transitions Partnership (DUT), depending on the area. They shall contribute to the development of the existing European knowledge base on the effectiveness and impacts resulting from the implementation of innovative, sustainable, green, and inclusive solutions in urban areas.

Clear commitments and contributions to Europe-wide take-up during and beyond the project are expected, which could, for example, be in the form of follow-up actions funded by CEF, ELENA, or similar programmes.

This topic requires the effective contribution of SSH (Social Sciences and Humanities) disciplines including ethics and the involvement of SSH experts, institutions as well as the inclusion of relevant SSH expertise, in order to produce meaningful and significant effects enhancing the societal impact of the related research activities. Inclusiveness of vulnerable populations (older people, children) as well as gender perspectives should be considered.