Unveiling urban governance diversity: Clustering cities based on mitigation actions

Area of Science:

• Urban planning and sustainability
• Climate change mitigation strategies
• Comparative urban governance

Background:

• Global climate change mitigation requires broad participation from cities worldwide.
• Current urban climate action assessments often overlook diverse city sizes and statuses.
• A more inclusive comparative framework is needed to understand varied urban climate responses.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess urban climate mitigation actions using a "more global" comparative approach.
• To explore if clustering methods can reveal patterns across socio-spatially diverse cities.
• To identify shared and distinct governance aspects in urban climate mitigation.

Main Methods:

• Utilized K-means clustering for pattern recognition in urban climate actions.
• Compared cities based on selected mitigation actions reported to the Carbon Disclosure Project.
• Analyzed governance patterns related to the nature and finance-implementation of actions.

Main Results:

• Identified five distinct clusters of urban climate mitigation actions.
• Demonstrated that governance patterns in climate actions transcend city size and global status.
• Revealed shared and distinct characteristics within the nature and finance-implementation of mitigation actions.

Conclusions:

• A "more global" urban comparison is essential for inclusive climate action participation.
• K-means clustering effectively reveals patterns in urban climate mitigation across diverse cities.
• Understanding transcending governance patterns can foster inter-city networking and broader comparative analysis.