The City and the Coming Climate: Climate Change in the Places We Live

by Brian Stone Jr.

This book is the first to explore the dramatic amplification of global warming underway in cities and the range of actions that individuals and governments can undertake to slow the pace of warming. A core thesis of the book is that the principal strategy currently advocated to mitigate climate change--the reduction of greenhouse gases--will not prove sufficient to measurably slow the rapid pace of warming in urban environments. Brian Stone explains the science of climate change in terms accessible to the nonscientist and with compelling anecdotes drawn from history and current events. The book is an ideal introduction to climate change and cities for students, policy makers, and anyone who wishes to gain insight into an issue critical to the future of our cities and the people who live in them.

Genres: Nonfiction, Urbanism, Climate Change, Science

206 pages, Paperback

First published March 22, 2012

Reviews

[T_Wragg]

Important notes on impacts of extreme heat events on public health (particularly with a focus on 2003 European heat wave which killed 70,000 people). How urban planning and design contribute urban heat (or not). Particularly adding vegetation to increase evapotranspiration and provide shade on south and west, and to add reflective roof materials to reduce the albedo effect. Consider this was written ten years ago and now both global climate change and urban heat are worse than they were. Impacts of land use change on rainforest climate processes have now been drastically worsened and the savannisation of the Amazon Rainforest is occurring to a significantly higher level than it was in this time. The conversation has moved on somewhat about land use change environmental and climate impacts. Good discussion about potential of reforestation to reduce climate change and for strategies at local and regional and building scale to reduce impacts of climate change on people who of course mainly live in cities. A bit of a lack of knowledge on indigenous governance of common pool resources for discussion about forests.

[Kirk]

This book taught me that there are many aspects of climate change that I wasn't aware of -- and that many of the world's climate change powers also are not aware of. Consequently, we are not addressing some of the most urgent climate change problems.

Most large U.S. cities not only are warming faster than the planet as a whole, they are warming at double the rate of global climate change, with major implications for human health. The implications for city dwellers are suggested by the 2003 European heat wave, in which 70,000 people died as a result of heat-induced illness. Managing urban heat (the heat island effect) is essential for mitigating climate change. After explaining the problems, the author gives concrete solutions to the problems.

[Greg]

Two exceptional things about this book:
1. A very good discussion of urban heat-island impacts to urban areas that will be worsened by climate change and the solutions to reducing those impacts.
2. A good summary of the timeline of human understanding of climate change.

The author makes repeated attempts to link the urban heat island solutions with necessary climate change mitigation policy, but never successfully shows that these local solutions can mitigate global temperature or greenhouse gas levels.

[Bob Kaufman]

Excellent discussion of components of Climate Change other than "greenhouse gases" and what can be done about them.

[Georgia Austin]

Fantastic book exploring the impact of urban islands around cities and how the world is not prepared for the health impacts of climate change and global warming.