Green building in regional strategies for sustainability: multi-actor governance and innovative building technologies in Europe, Australia, and Canada (GreenRegio)

随着对全球气候变化的关注和证据日益增加，可持续性的思想日益影响和指导着世界范围内关于经济发展的概念和政策辩论。减少温室气体排放的政策目标已被列入许多国际协议，如《京都议定书》，以及多国和国家倡议，包括欧盟可持续发展战略、加拿大联邦可持续发展战略和澳大利亚国家生态可持续发展战略。最近，环境署的《绿色经济报告》（2011）提供了一项全球评估，强调绿色经济是实现环境、经济和社会目标（如创造就业、减少贫困）的“增长新引擎”。在联合国环境规划署报告的单独一章中讨论的建筑部门已被确定为减少温室气体排放的重要部门。虽然它是与人类有关的温室气体排放的最大来源，但由于改造现有或建造新建筑物的成本较低、技术的可用性以及向绿色能源供应和需求的过渡，它也被视为具有最大的降低排放潜力。尽管环境变化具有全球性，但地方和区域尺度往往被认为是应对可持续发展挑战的重要领域。可持续的地方和区域发展研究侧重于可持续的解决方案，包括绿色技术、机构重组和交通管理，仅举几例，往往忽略了首先如何定义地方或区域发展的考虑。对地方和区域发展的分析不仅要考虑不同的空间尺度，还要考虑多种利益。同样，关于工业绿色化、技术变革和绿色创新的工作经常过分强调经济行为者的重要性，而忽视了其他重要利益以及它们在不同地理尺度上的联系。最近的工作促进了政治经济学和制度观点，以克服这些缺点。拟议的研究项目侧重于绿色建筑作为可持续发展的区域战略，使用欧洲（卢森堡和弗莱堡）、澳大利亚（布里斯班）和加拿大（温哥华）的例子。它寻求在技术变革和创新方面促进理解可持续的地方和区域发展，实施一种考虑到多种利益和空间尺度的整体和体制方法。该项目侧重于不同空间尺度上经济、政府和非政府利益之间的相互作用，以及这些相互作用如何潜在地转化为“地方和区域创新系统”，或者它们如何促进或阻碍技术变革。所选视角超越商业层面，分析促进技术创新的地方和区域机构（区域背景包括规范、价值体系、信仰）以及它们如何受到外部事件的影响。

With growing concerns and evidence regarding global climate change, ideas of sustainability have increasingly influenced and guided conceptual and policy debates on economic development worldwide. Policy goals to lower greenhouse gas emissions have been captured in a number of international agreements like the Kyoto protocol as well as multinational and national initiatives including the EU sustainable development strategy, Canada’s Federal Sustainable Development Strategy and Australia’s National Strategy for Ecologically Sustainable Development. Most recently, UNEP’s Green Economy Report (2011) provides a global assessment emphasizing the greening of economies as ‘new engine of growth’ that meets environmental, economic and social goals (e.g., employment creation, poverty reduction). The building sector, discussed in a separate chapter in the UNEP report, has been identified as significant in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. While it is the largest contributor to human-related greenhouse gas emissions, it is also seen as holding greatest potential to lower emissions based on the low cost of retrofitting existing or constructing new buildings, the availability of technologies, and transition to green energy supply and demand. Despite the global character of environmental change, the local and regional scales are often identified as important arenas to tackle the challenges of sustainable development. Sustainable local and regional development research has focused on sustainable solutions including green technologies, institutional restructuring and transportation management, just to name a few, often neglecting considerations on how local or regional development is defined in the first place. An analysis of local and regional development has to take into account not only different spatial scales but also a multitude of interests. Similarly, work on the greening of industry, technological change, and green innovations has frequently over-emphasized the importance of economic actors neglecting other important interests and how they are connected at different geographic scales. Recent work has promoted political economy and institutional perspectives to overcome these shortcomings. The proposed research project focuses on green building as regional strategy for sustainability using examples from Europe (Luxembourg and Freiburg), Australia (Brisbane), and Canada (Vancouver). It seeks to contribute to understanding sustainable local and regional development in respect to technological change and innovations implementing a holistic and institutional approach that takes into account multiple interests and spatial scales. The project focuses on the interactions between economic, government, and non-government interests at different spatial scales, and how these interactions potentially translate into 'local and regional innovation systems', or how they promote or hinder technological change. The chosen perspective looks beyond the business level to analyse local and regional institutions (regional context incl. norms, value systems, beliefs) that promote technological innovations and how they are influenced by external events.