Future Cities · Sustainability, Energy, Innovation, Climate Change, Transport, Housing, Work, Circular Economy, Education & Environmental Solutions

“I think believing in something is also part of the responsibility of the believer to sift through these things. So there are a lot of people saying I'm green because they do something less badly. So for me, it’s not green yet, it's just less bad. It's not really good yet. It's not really fabulous, but that just means there's an opportunity to keep going to share information and help each other be...

William McDonough is a globally recognized leader in sustainable design and development. He has written and lectured extensively on design as the first signal of human intention. He co-authored Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year.  McDonough advises leaders on ESG strategies through McDonough Innovation, is an architect with W...

“It's always difficult to avoid charges of being nostalgic if we talk about going back to things. Back to the past or forward to the past, but there are principles that existed in preindustrial/early industrial cities and which were overturned by key technological inventions of the late 19th and early 20th century, particularly the railway, the motorcar, of course, the internal combustion engine o...

David Simon is Professor of Development Geography and Director for External Engagement in the School of Life Sciences and the Environment, Royal Holloway, University of London. He was also Director of Mistra Urban Futures, Gothenburg, Sweden from 2014–2019. A former Rhodes Scholar, he specialises in cities, climate change and sustainability, and the relationships between theory, policy and practic...

“One of the things I’ve noticed is that a lot of those younger people are actually much nicer than they need to be. And they have to realize that this is going to be your world. It turns out the way you want to make it and so you should be thinking now about what you want out of this. What do you want that world to be? Do not wait around until the two generations beyond you have gone ahead and don...

Mike Pondsmith is an accomplished roleplaying, tabletop, and video game designer. He is best known for his work with the publisher R. Talsorian Games where he developed the majority of the company’s roleplaying games since its founding in 1982. He is credited as the author of several tabletop roleplaying games such as Mekton, Cyberpunk, and Castle Falkenstein and was recently involved with creatin...

“What is societal progress? I think the last 70 years, clearly, in the post World War II period, we have been thinking of economic growth and have been equating that with societal progress. To an extent of course that's right. To an extent, we need this economic growth to lift people out of poverty. We’ve kind of lost the reasoning. We have been following only this economic growth paradigm measure...

Alice Schmidt is a global sustainability advisor who has worked in 30 countries on 4 continents with 70+ organisations of all shapes and sizes. She has a deep passion for creating opportunities and win-wins across the social, environmental and economic spheres. Many of her experiences are highlighted in the new book “ The Sustainability Puzzle : How Systems Thinking, Climate Action, Circularity an...

“It's kind of a scary thought. We've got these PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), you hear them now referred to as forever chemicals because these chemicals–none of these existed on the planet prior to World War II–they're fairly recent invention and they have this unique chemical structure that makes them incredibly useful in a lot of different products, manufacturing operations, but als...

Rob Bilott is a partner in the Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky offices of the law firm, Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP , where he has practiced in the Environmental and Litigation Practice Groups for over 31 years. During that time, Rob has handled and led some of the most novel and complex cases in the country involving damage from exposure to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (“PFAS”), i...

“Net-zero is a big idea. It’s a big theme. And, unfortunately, what's going up are many ways to look like you're doing net-zero when you're not. So in the ideal world, getting to net-zero means essentially reducing your emissions, and then, where you have residual emissions left, that means you might need to have negative emissions. For example, it's relatively easy to decarbonize the power sector...

Bill Hare is a physicist and climate scientist with 30 years of experience in science, impacts and policy responses to climate change and stratospheric ozone depletion. He is a founder and CEO of Climate Analytics , which was established to synthesize and advance scientific knowledge on climate change and provide state-of-the-art solutions to global and national climate change policy cha...

“Is this true that we test for fewer than 100 chemicals in water, but in fact, there are thousands that go untested?” “There are thousands just like there are in air, just like there are in food. We sometimes compartmentalize too much. We forget, but what is food? Food is made up of chemicals. And I think we need to be broader in our understanding because, for example, we all have on us and within...

Dr. Linda Birnbaum is a scientist emeritus and former director of the National institute of Environmental Health Sciences and of the National Toxicology Program. She is also a Scholar in Residence at the Nicholas School of the Environment of Duke University, and an adjunct full professor at Duke, University of North Carolina, and Yale University School of Public Health. She is the author...

“So, if we study transportation, then we need to study urban development and infrastructure. Suddenly, we need to think about housing. We need to think about the co-location of jobs and shops, and you realize it's all connected. That might be one of the challenges of urban sustainability. It's all connected. So the way we move around is connected to the way we built the city. And I think the intri...

Roland Geyer is a Professor at the Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, University of California at Santa Barbara, and the author of The Business of Less. Since 2000 he has worked with a wide range of governmental organizations, trade associations, and companies on environmental sustainability issues. His overarching goal is to help develop the knowledge, tools, and methods necessa...

“This is a very important question because cities are really living labs of everything that we're doing in terms of energy policy, and it’s extremely important that whatever we are putting forward in terms of policy, if it is not embraced by the citizens in cities on the local level, the best policies will not serve any purpose if they not really taken up by citizens. 
Of all of the Sustainable De...

Seth is a lawyer, activist, entrepreneur, public speaker and New York Times Bestselling Author. He is an expert in water management and conservation. His first book Let There Be Water: Israel’s Solution for a Water-Starved World talks about how a government in one of the driest regions in the world revolutionised water managed. His second book Troubled Water: What's Wrong with What We Drink , pres...

“On average in advanced societies, about 70% of freshwater that’s consumed is consumed by agriculture. In less developed countries, sometimes as high as 95% of the freshwater goes to agriculture, which means that you’re depleting the amount of water available for the environment. You’re depleting amount of groundwater to preserve for the future, especially in dry times, and it creates a stress for...

"I'm a deep believer in the values of democracy, human rights, and the system where civil society and people play a key role in the discussions about society and also assuming responsibility, whether it's through labor unions, youth organizations…I think one key solution at the level of society is more equality. More equal societies bring a lot of advantages. I think that is a critical component t...

Hans Bruyninckx is the Executive Director of the European Environment Agency . He is a political scientist and international relations scholar specializing in global environmental governance, climate change, and sustainable development. Previous to his work at EEA, he was head of the HIVA Research Institute and of the Political Science department at KU Leuven, senior member of the interdisciplinar...

“We live in buildings and cities because that’s what generates a living for a lot of people, but where we’re most comfortable as humans is when we’re in nature. Your generation owns this. Don’t let anybody take it from you or damage it because you own it. The next generation is the one that owns it and view it with a sense of ownership and a sense of pride and a sense of protection because there a...

Ron Gonen is the Founder and CEO of Closed Loop Partners , a New York Based investment firm that focuses on building the circular economy. In his fulfilling career, Ron has been recognized as the “Champion of Earth” by the United Nations Environment Program. Serving as the Deputy Commissioner of Sanitation, Recycling and Sustainability in New York City under the Bloomberg Administration, Ron Gonen...

Since 2014, Rowin Snijder has been designing and building with his company Le Compostier “worm hotels” for community composting projects. A worm hotel is a structure in which an ecosystem of compost organisms work together to transform organic waste into beautiful worm compost. With a garden on top of each worm hotel, they give space to nature in neighborhoods and show us we can use organic waste...

“Know first of all that we are not separate from nature, but that we are part of it. To not even think of what is the benefit for me from it. I find it a very beautiful the concept of the food forest. Like you're actually building soil, and then the surplus is that you get some food back. To focus more on giving than on taking, especially for children. What I like to teach my children–really look...