Towards Urban Resource Flow Estimates in Data Scarce Environments: The Case of African Cities
Name
JEP_2015092313560213.pdf
Description
Published version
Size
1.14 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
6d48aa9e00dae6d187595fe29823d10f
Author(s)
Currie, Paul
Lay-Sleeper, Ethan
Fernández, John E.
Kim, Jenny
Musango, Josephine Kaviti
Date Issued
September 2015
Journal
Journal of Environmental Protection
Publisher
Scientific Research Publishing, Inc,
Citation
Currie, Paul, et al. "Towards Urban Resource Flow Estimates in Data Scarce Environments: The Case of African Cities." Journal of Environmental Protection 6, 9 (September 2015): 1066-1083 © 2015 Author(s)
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Data sourcing challenges in African nations have led many African urban infrastructure developments to be implemented with minimal scientific backing to support their success. In some cases this may directly impact a city’s ability to reach service delivery, economic growth and human development goals, let alone the city’s ability to protect ecosystem services upon which it relies. As an attempt to fill this gap, this paper describes an exploratory process used to determine city-level demographic, economic and resource flow data for African nations. The approach makes use of scaling and clustering techniques to form acceptable and utilizable representations of selected African cities. Variables that may serve as the strongest predictors for resource consumption intensity in African nations and cities were explored, in particular, the aspects of the Koppen Climate Zones, estimates of average urban income and GDP, and the influence of urban primacy. It is expected that the approach examined will provide a step towards estimating and understanding African cities and their resource profiles.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Architecture
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.4236/JEP.2015.69094
