With the continuous migration of people towards metropolitan areas in search of employment, the demands for core services and energy, coupled with an increasing awareness of the impact of climate change, have placed the management and planning of global urban energy under a lot of pressure. Trends toward urban energy service transformations that offer greater affordability, reliability, efficiency and adaptability provide hope for a global sustainable future. At the same time, there are also limits to these transitions, as well as risks involved. For example, on one end of the spectrum, our urban energy future includes land use sprawl, high fossil fuel use, pollution, and unhealthy urban conditions. On the other side of this transition spectrum is more energy choices, and healthier, more livable cities, along with less energy use and fewer greenhouse gas emissions. What the future might hold for transforming the world's cities depends upon an understanding of the risks of current trajectories and the opportunities for and limitations to developing sustainable urban energy systems.This edited volume brings together leading experts on the prospects and challenges of urban energy innovation and on related-economic, social and environmental sustainability transitions. The focus of the volume is on multidisciplinary reviews, research informing technologies and policies for sustainability, and analytical insights addressing rapid urbanization and changes across a diverse typology of global cities. The volume will include an overview of the current state of urban energy systems. It will also document and evaluate urban energy prospects for a sustainable, resilient future.

The city is the principal site through which globalisation occurs. This is reflected in the various social, economic, and political changes that have not only added emphasis to dynamics of cities, but have also multiplied the contradictions and tensions underlying urban development. These eight volumes - available as one set or as two four volume sets (Set One - Urban Studies - Economy / Set Two Urban Studies Society) - are edited by Ronan Paddison, Editor of Urban Studies, the key journal in the discipline. Each volume is in turn edited by an acknowledged specialist. Together the eight volumes will provide researchers with answers to the following questions: " How do we theorize the city " Why do cities exist? " How do we begin to understand the processes underlying the structure and dynamism of cities? " How can state intervention influence such processes positively? " How are cities governed? " How should we cope intellectually with the uniqueness and variability of cities?