SEA Hi! Forum | Li Xiaojiang: Beware of Danger - Pay Attention to Disaster Threats and Climate Resilience Climate Change | Disasters | Resilience
When discussing urban safety resilience, we find that various disasters, safety accidents, and public health incidents are becoming increasingly frequent, especially the threat of disasters brought about by climate change has become almost the norm. Therefore, the issue of urban safety resilience is no longer about "being prepared for danger", but rather "being prepared for danger".
Disaster threat and climate resilience are two different topics, but they are closely related.
The issue of urban safety and resilience is receiving increasing attention, partly due to the increasing complexity of urban operating systems, making cities more vulnerable; On the other hand, the value of cherishing life has been popularized. Among the urban disasters in China, non-traditional natural disasters deserve special attention, that is, disasters brought about by global climate change, including extreme weather such as rainstorm and high temperature. Special attention should also be paid to related disasters. For example, the most serious related disaster caused by the extremely heavy rainstorm in Zhengzhou in 2021 is that a large number of high-rise residential residents cannot live normally due to water and power outages.
Firstly, from a broad perspective of disaster threats, improving urban safety resilience requires attention to the following aspects. One is to establish long-term adaptation strategies. Many changes caused by climate change are irreversible, and we need to be prepared for long-term adaptation. The second is to prepare contingency plans for short-term shocks. The extreme high temperature in Sichuan and Chongqing for a long time in 2022, and the "three encounters" of the storm surge when the extremely heavy rainstorm in Zhengzhou and the typhoon "fireworks" landed in Shanghai in 2021 all warn the city to improve its rapid emergency response capability. Thirdly, we need to strengthen the synergy between cities. More and more disasters have proven that every city cannot be isolated and requires more active collaboration. At the same time, attention should also be paid to fairness, justice, and green low-carbon in enhancing urban resilience.
As a planning practitioner, disaster response should be considered from three levels. At the overall planning level, a comprehensive assessment of urban safety resilience should be conducted to avoid relying too much on traditional probability analysis methods, and scenario based approaches should be used to envision the most severe situations that cities may face. Next is layout optimization, avoiding disaster prone areas, reducing disaster exposure, and reducing disaster losses. The third is to strengthen the construction of disaster prevention systems, combining engineering disaster prevention measures with climate adaptation actions. Due to the significant differences within cities, it is necessary to identify the weaknesses in safety resilience in different regions and adopt targeted disaster prevention strategies.
Overall, urban development should shift from a focus on economic growth to a focus on human safety and convenience. For example, the construction and development of high-rise residential buildings and underground spaces must have sufficient safety and disaster prevention considerations and safety indicators constraints, improve the rescue and evacuation safety performance in the event of a fire in high-rise residential buildings, and overcome the shortcomings of high disaster susceptibility and rescue difficulty in underground spaces.
Research has shown that when a country's per capita GDP reaches the stage of 25000 to 30000 US dollars, the per capita energy demand will no longer increase. However, China's current per capita GDP is 12000 US dollars, which has a large growth space, which means that the per capita energy demand will also increase. Therefore, China's "dual carbon" goal has designed a difficult and strongly constrained path for itself, but it is also a path that must be completed. The population size and resource characteristics determine that China can only achieve modernization and prosperity through a green and low-carbon path, and the "dual carbon" strategy should simultaneously meet the growing needs of the people for a better life, rather than a low-level, frugal "carbon neutrality". That is to say, China's promotion of the "dual carbon" strategy must not sacrifice demand, but focus on the fair benefits of different groups in the "dual carbon" strategy.
Urban green development should have a full lifecycle roadmap, covering the entire chain of resource protection and reduction, green production and creation, green consumption and use, harmless degradation and reuse. Urban green development not only requires the comprehensive promotion of green and low-carbon technologies, materials, equipment, and public services, but also the promotion of green and low-carbon lifestyles, such as advocating green transportation, staying away from appliances, healthy eating, getting close to nature, and minimalist living, while reducing resource energy consumption and carbon emissions without compromising personal well-being.
