Utilizing the Urban Fabric as the Solar Power Plant of the Future

Tackling the Risk of Stranded Electricity Assets with Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence

“…In the case of a 1.5°C temperature limit or even lower, this budget would be drastically contracted. It is for this reason that national, state and local governments must prioritize low-carbon transformations; for instance, (i) ramping up renewable energy over the next two decades, (2) switching from oil to less carbonintensive gas [5,15,25,42,48,55,[75][76][77], and (3) keeping large global deposits of coal, oil, and gas reserves "in the ground" ( Table 2) [11,13,79]. This call has led to the "keep fossil fuels in the ground" initiative, "fossil fuel divestment" campaign, and "unburnable carbon" resistance movement, as a way to compel companies which are active in hydrocarbons or with high coal, oil, and gas reserves in their portfolios to reinvest elsewhere [17,63,[79][80][81][82][83][84].…”

“…Urban energy planning: With ML and AI applications, available building 1 energy use data can be extrapolated to predict energy use at the city level. Furthermore, ML is uniquely capable of supporting improvements in "smart energy frameworks for smart cities" [25], including building codes, informing policymakers about utilizing urban rooftops for solar PV electricity generation [55,108], retrofitting strategies using automated performance control [117], public-private partnerships to improve low-and moderate-income (LMI) stipulations and equitable electricity access [15,64].…”

Smart Energy Frameworks for Smart Cities: The Need for Polycentrism

“…Furthermore, because DERs accommodate all generation sources particularly intermittent, non-dispatchable renewable energy sources, storage options, and lowcarbon renewable natural gas-fired generation systems as well as cogeneration, they sustain a clean energy economy and urban infrastructure development. DERs also offer cities opportunities to reduce their near-and long-term greenhouse gas emissions through "solar city" strategy and economics (Byrne and Taminiau 2018), thereby mitigating climate impacts by reducing total GHG emissions. DERs perform twin functions: (1) adaptation and (2) mitigation of climate impacts.…”

“…The nonlinearity and complexity of smart grid challenges, especially climate risks, urbanization, demographic shifts, systemic environmental change, and energy infrastructure investment deficit facing many cities, can be addressed by a "polycentric" strategy that incorporates shared learning, adaptive management, civil society strategies, and creative experimentation to support existing transformative innovations and empower local energy development. Initially proposed in the 1960s and 1970s (Aligica and Tarko 2012), polycentric strategy has been applied to evaluate "solar city" economics (Byrne and Taminiau 2018), climate justice (Fischedick et al 2018;Martinez-Alier et al 2016;Ostrom 2010), urban energy planning for 100% renewability in Frankfurt and Munich cities (Radzi 2018), alleviating urban traffic congestion (Li et al 2019), assessing energy efficiency gap (Zou et al 2019), and evaluating new capacities for transformative climate governance in New York City (the United States) and Rotterdam (the Netherlands) (Hölscher et al 2019). In terms of smart energy infrastructure governance, polycentric policy underscores the elements summarized in Table 3 transparency, inclusivity, accountability, and responsive network practices.…”

“…(The problem is particularly acute in urban areas, where growing populations stress society's support systems and natural disasters, accidents, and terrorist attacks threaten infrastructure safety and security.) Diversifying energy systemsthrough the interlinked mix of clean energy technologies, institutional change, user-centered design practices, and market and regulatory innovationscan help cities achieve their low-carbon objectives, promote greater energy security and electric grid stability, and improve access to modern energy services as new energy demand is projected to take place in rapidly urbanizing metropolitan regions and megacities (Taminiau et al 2019;Nyangon and Byrne 2018;Byrne and Taminiau 2018;Taminiau et al 2017). Therefore, the investment decisions cities make today in high-growth intensive sectors especially infrastructure such as roads, electrical power systems, sewers, and buildings will influence the evolution of urban spatial structure and their socio-environmental dynamics for several decades.…”