This interactive “Policy Tool for Renovation” facilitates the comparison and analysis of twelve renovation policy packages for residential buildings from Europe and the United States. Fourteen specially developed criteria have been developed, with the support of a panel of international experts, to enable this analysis.

The tool allows for:

1. Compare policy packages based on different criteria by selecting and deselecting criteria in the interactive tool above.

Green building is cost-effective

1. Upfront investment in green building makes properties more valuable, with an average expected increase in value of 4 percent. By virtue of lowered maintenance and energy costs the return on investment from green building is rapid: green retrofit projects are generally expected to pay for itself in just seven years. 3

This page visualised the key data for the Green Growth Indicators report, by allowing users to compare the air pollution, carbon production, land resources and green innovation in between OECD countries.

The original policy issued by The Science Council of Japan was in Japanese, and this English article summarises the policy that outlined a roadmap to realize a healthy low-carbon society. The aim of the policy is to build a low carbon footprint and high environmental performance. There are four parts as below: 

(1) Increasing motivation for new, healthy, low-carbon lifestyles and behavioral changes

Cities need to become ‘smarter’ if we are to save the planet. John Dora, editor of a special issue of ICE Engineering Sustainability journal on smart cities, says the ingenuity of civil engineers will be essential for their delivery.