As part of BSR’s multipart series on sustainable urban growth, we recently spoke with several influential stakeholders about the outlook for Cairo, a city that has experienced tremendous political change in the past few years.

Given that Cairo is the largest and one of the most densely populated cities in the Middle East and Africa, (more…)

The Sea of Galilee (or “Lake Kinneret” in Hebrew), which, until recently, has been the main source of drinking water for Israel, is indeed drying up, but the “Kinneret College In the Jordan Valley” located on the shore of the Sea of Galilee is bursting with creativity and technology in the water arena, promising to become a source of innovation for the (more…)

India’s Minister of Urban Planning Kamal Nath just completed a visit to Israel (February 12-14) during which an agreement was signed between the two nations aimed at fostering cooperation, with a focus on urban water.

Oded Distel, Head of Israel NewTech, the Israeli government program dedicated to supporting Israel’s (more…)

A panel formed to study solutions to increased flooding in Singapore has urged the government to require green roofs on new and retrofitted buildings.

The 12-member panel, which was created after torrential rains caused flash flooding across eastern and central Singapore last year, said improved (more…)

The numbers surrounding urbanization worldwide are staggering. In 2008, the number of people living in cities, for the first time in civilization, surpassed the number of people living in rural settings. Although urbanization is happening on every continent, the story could not be more dramatic in (more…)

I recently set out to look into all electric car sharing programs, like the one recently started in San Diego by car2go. After a little research into the program – run by a wholly-owned subsidiary of Daimler, stocked with Daimler Smart Fortwo EVs, and using ECOtality (more…)

Urbanization in the 21st century is creating a set of new challenges for governance. How will national, state/provincial, and city governments effectively provide vital services to citizens? And as a greater portion of the world’s population gets connected through smart phones and other slick new data-sharing devices, how will people access those services? (more…)

Surprising and disturbing news coming out of China indicates that the nation is having difficulty feeding its growing population.

The news is surprising for several reasons. First, China has a one-child rule in place, so the population shouldn’t be rising that fast (or so one would think).

Second, China – at 9,326,410 square (more…)

According to a popular and pernicious myth, you can’t fight poverty in the developing world without fossil fuel energy and the emissions that come with it. Yet while trumpeting this idea makes a good marketing strategy for the coal industry, more and more developing countries are proving you can in fact have environmentally responsible and (more…)

Rapid population growth in the developing world does not significantly contribute to rising greenhouse gas emissions and focusing on the population explosion in poor countries diverts attention from the far more serious issue of over-consumption in rich countries, according to a new study.

The study, conducted by the International Institute for Environment and Development, analyzed population growth and CO2 emissions from 1980 to 2005 and concluded that rising populations in sub-Saharan Africa and other poor regions have had a negligible impact on global warming.

(more…)