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Regenerative living cities and the urban climate–biodiversity–wellbeing nexus

Nature Climate Change volume 12, pages 601–604 (2022)Cite this article

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The expansion of urban environments contributes to climate change and biodiversity loss. Implementing nature-based strategies to create ‘regenerative living cities’ will be critical for climate change mitigation and adaptation and will produce measurable biodiversity and wellbeing co-benefits.

Biodiverse vegetated habitats provide essential regulating ecosystem services, such as temperature moderation and disturbance prevention, through shading, evapotranspiration, soil infiltration and carbon sequestration4. In many cities there is reduced vegetation and a high proportion of impervious surfaces. Therefore, urban ecosystem services often occur, if possible, through various replacement technologies and grey infrastructure. The effectiveness of this and accruing benefits are often less than what green or hybrid grey and green infrastructure alternatives could provide5. For example, in contrast to sea walls, the restoration of native mangroves protects vulnerable coastal areas from sea-level rise and increased storm intensity, while also sequestering carbon and supporting local livelihoods6.

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Fig. 1: The positive feedback loop between climate change and biodiversity loss in the urban built environment context.
Fig. 2: The Gardens by the Bay in Singapore.

Tuul & Bruno Morandi/The Image Bank/Getty

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the NUWAO (Nature-based Urban design for Wellbeing and Adaptation in Oceania) project, funded by a Marsden grant from the Royal Society of New Zealand (www.nuwao.org.nz). Additional support was provided by the Restoring Urban Nature Project funded by an Aotearoa New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment Endeavour grant. The views expressed herein are the authors’ own.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Future Environments, Auckland University of Technology, Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand

    M. Pedersen Zari

  2. Wellington School of Architecture, Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand

    M. MacKinnon, K. Varshney & N. Bakshi

Authors
  1. M. Pedersen Zari
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  2. M. MacKinnon
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  3. K. Varshney
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  4. N. Bakshi
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Contributions

M.P.Z. conceived the concept for this Comment and led the project coordination. K.V. conceived of the graphics. All authors contributed to the research, writing and revising and editing the manuscript.

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Correspondence to M. Pedersen Zari.

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Pedersen Zari, M., MacKinnon, M., Varshney, K. et al. Regenerative living cities and the urban climate–biodiversity–wellbeing nexus. Nat. Clim. Chang. 12, 601–604 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-022-01390-w

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