Keywords

1 Introduction

The case studies of Freiburg, Vancouver, Luxembourg and Brisbane covered in this book illustrate the different strategies and roles that cities play in climate change mitigation. Freiburg and Vancouver are cities where sustainability more generally and green building more specifically have shaped local politics and urban development for the past few decades. Sustainable urban development in the two cities can be characterised by innovations in green building that provide impact beyond the city. The two cities can be seen as leading urban green building transitions even though the scope and scale of their leadership may differ. For example, Freiburg’s Vauban neighbourhood with the solar settlement is emblematic in attracting significant numbers of visitors from all around the world including politicians, planners and architects who seek inspiration, ideas, knowledge and models they can take back to, and adopt and adapt in, their home cities (González 2011). Vancouver’s Olympic Village (OV) is seen as being similarly novel and ambitious but mostly within the North American context: the OV illustrates how climate change mitigation is showcased using green building features (Fig. 10.1). Whereas Freiburg’s Vauban has been described as having been shaped by a very specific context consisting of locally grown expertise and public environmental concerns in particular with respect to renewable energy (see Chaps. 5 and 9; Fastenrath 2015; Fastenrath and Braun 2016), the objectives of Vancouver’s OV were also influenced by external visions, including those of the International Olympic Committee (Sect. 6.5).

Fig. 10.1
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Information on the Green Building Audio Tour in the Olympic Village, Vancouver (Photo: Sebastian Fastenrath)

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Freiburg and Vancouver are popularly seen as examples where sustainability is rooted in the local culture and context. Using the multi-level perspective (MLP), the two cities can be understood as niches that foster innovation in green building. Brisbane and Luxembourg, in contrast, are depicted as followers rather than leaders. In and within the two cities, niches emerged more recently and within very different regional contexts. Here, green building is more likely to be adopted and adapted from other places, rather than originally conceived and developed into replicable models for elsewhere. But the two cities nonetheless showcase urban green building experiments and expertise (albeit at a different scale). In the case of Brisbane, the city looks back to early leadership in solar technologies for buildings and more recently features some innovative social housing experiments such as Green Square and Common Ground (Sects. 7.4.1 and 7.4.2). Both cities illustrate how political agendas both hinder and accelerate progress towards green building. While green building in Brisbane is challenged by changing and discontinuous political agendas with sustainability policies being rolled back in recent years, Luxembourg’s growth agenda, in contrast, seeks to establish the country as an international leader in the field of green (building) technology—a strategy that the country applied to the finance sector in the 1990s. Luxembourg’s green building projects have been largely inspired by knowledge, practices, standards and models from elsewhere that are being imported and applied to local projects as illustrated by the triple-certified (HQE, BREEAM, DGNB) Solarwind building in Windhof (Sect. 8.3.1).

Leadership is not only characterised by the degree to which it is recognised, copied and adapted by others as illustrated by numerous city rankings and awards. Urban leadership is being claimed by cities with the aim to position themselves, often involving competitive elements. Further, urban green building transitions are not always driven by climate change imperatives focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. They also reflect political and economic ambitions to brand the city internationally (e.g. job creation, economic growth). For example, the City of Vancouver actively promotes its Greenest City 2020 Action Plan (GCAP) and measures its performance against other urban climate strategies internationally, not least to position the city as a desirable and liveable place to attract economic investment and skilled labour. Competitive positioning and entrepreneurial interests similarly shape Luxembourg’s greening strategy. Flows and connections thus consist not only of the transfer of innovations, knowledge, practices and models through cities and other networks but also of comparative and competitive positioning between cities expressed through neoliberal and entrepreneurial strategies and actions.

This chapter focuses on these connections and flows of ideas, knowledge, models, schemes and innovations within and between places to evaluate the role of cities in green building transitions. It critically analyses aspects of knowledge transfer and learning, green leadership and positioning within and beyond cities. It does so by focusing on spatial and temporal dimensions of greening comparing and contrasting examples from the four cities covered in the book. From a spatial perspective, cities as places of transitions are understood here as multi-scalar and relational. They are shaped by both internal and external influences and speak to internal and external audiences (McCann 2013)—they are not bounded or isolated entities. Yet, cities are frequently associated with locally specific cultures, institutions and other localised characteristics. Leadership is frequently seen as relying on such intrinsic qualities, while those cities following and imitating green leaders are seen as being shaped by models and ideas developed elsewhere (González 2011). This chapter probes these associations with innovation and leadership with locally generated or home-grown strengths. It highlights how objectives, meanings and discourses of greening are relational both across space and time. It hence responds to questions of comparability and transferability and argues for an open engagement with green initiatives that takes into account spatial and temporal relations.

The chapter is structured as follows. The next section focuses on cities as places and spaces of transitions where innovations happen. It describes and compares Freiburg, Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg as different (alternative) milieus (Longhurst 2013) shaped by internal and external factors. Section 10.3 focuses on the temporal dimension and considers how the role of cities may change and transform green building over time. Section 10.4 critically discusses green leadership, marketing and branding as one facet of green building as it emerges from the four case studies. The final section presents a synthesis of mobile knowledge and ideas as they occur in the four case studies.

2 Places of Transition

The importance of place in providing stimulus for economic development is postulated across human geography subdisciplines. From an economic and regional development perspective, geographers have studied the factors and conditions promoting innovations. One of the main fields in economic geography relates to understanding the role of innovations for economic growth including new technologies, forms of organisation, management, communication and presentation and to offering insights on drivers and barriers to innovation. Knowledge, learning and other flows between different actors and institutions are seen as crucial in fostering creativity and innovation in certain places (Amin and Cohendet 2004; Bathelt et al. 2016; Boschma et al. 2013). Such research highlights the importance of place and spatial proximity (Boschma 2005; Morgan 2004) as illustrated by work on clusters, creative milieus (Becattini 1991; Camagni and Capello 2002) and institutional thickness (Amin and Thrift 1995). While most of these contributions are concerned with regional contexts, the urban scale is considered pivotal when it comes to framework conditions and cross-sectoral exchange amongst people working in the same city. For example, Florida (2005) sees highly skilled white collar workers as major drivers for economic growth and associates them with urban environments linked to a high density or availability of certain infrastructure (including research, cultural and social institutions). While work on clusters highlights the importance of proximity and hence place in respect to innovation, Bathelt et al.’s (2016) study also emphasises the role of pipelines, which describe knowledge exchange networks between often faraway places that offer inspiration, stimulation and know-how.

While economic geographers have primarily focused on innovation in respect to economic growth, other scholars have focused on the social and cultural context conditions (such as value systems and the existence of organised activism) that favour changes that challenge existing policies and practices as they can be associated with more radical transformations of existing systems (Affolderbach 2011; Marston 2003). Similarly, considerable attention has been directed to the role of place including geographically fixed characteristics. Based on his work on Totnes in England, Longhurst (2013) uses the concept of alternative milieu to describe the development and nature of alternative places. He understands alternative places as those associated with “alternative practices and institutions that emerged from the Counterculture” as a middle-class movement in the 1960s (Longhurst 2013: 2101) but which may take different expressions. Longhurst (2013) suggests five different typologies including alternative pathways that describe the emergence of new, often green, alternative institutions such as green building (understood as going beyond technological greening) as well as alternative lifestyles that can be associated with green building and lived sustainabilities (see Pickerill 2015: for an example on green living). An alternative milieu thus captures “the geographical density of countercultural networks, institutions, groups, practices, and individuals that coexist within and around a specific locality” (Longhurst 2013: 2103). It is the density and diversity of alternative actors, practices and institutions and, in particular, their geographic embeddedness through physical expressions that are crucial. Longhurst (2013) refers to Amin and Thrift’s (1995) concept of institutional thickness that constitutes the self-sustaining character of the alternative milieu. This also includes natural features (e.g. appealing environmental landscapes) which have been ascribed a role in promoting alterity in the literature (Lees 1999; Longhurst 2013).

Recent work emphasising the debordering of models, knowledge, practices and success stories includes research on the role of policy mobility and the transfer, adaptation, mutation and adoption of ideas, knowledge, models and practices from elsewhere (e.g. Peck and Theodore 2010; McCann and Ward 2011; McCann 2011) (see Sect. 3.4). The core argument of this literature is that when urban policies are adopted in other places, they are not merely replicated but are transformed in the process resulting in urban assemblages of local and global aspects. For example, successful greening strategies such as Freiburg’s green neighbourhood developments of Rieselfeld and Vauban may act as models for other cities, but what is being transferred, deemed appropriate and replicated will differ based on those involved in the process as well as the new context the model is sought to be transferred to. Objectives and meanings may change in the process as well, as policy-makers, planners and other actors discuss, envision and design subsequent policy proposals. The policy mobility literature seeks to reveal these relations that bring inspirations, ideas, interpretations and other influences together leading to new expressions of policies. Rather than contradicting ideas such as the local milieu, policy mobility adds another layer by highlighting the relational character of (local) innovations and knowledge. The local hence consists of both internal as well as external forces and influences.

Freiburg’s trajectory of greening has been described by many respondents as influenced by two main local stakeholder groups who were pivotal in driving the green building transition: its residents and its scientific community. A high level of environmental consciousness characterises Freiburg’s residents, and the opposition to the planned nuclear power plant in nearby Wyhl has frequently been mentioned in this regard. This opposition to an identified threat to local livelihoods is common in building up local solidarity and shared goals (Devine-Wright 2013). Linked to this, Freiburg has seen the emergence of scientific knowledge communities focused around alternative energy generation. The local energy scene that emerged in the 1970s demonstrated early on that alternatives to fossil fuel and nuclear power were possible.

The narrative around environmental activism in Vancouver presents a similar picture. Vancouver and the West Coast more generally have been associated with the rise of the conservation movement in the 1970s and 1980s (Affolderbach 2008). While British Columbia’s economy is largely shaped by the resource sector, respondents ascribed the foundation of Greenpeace in Vancouver, environmentalist David Suzuki and academic thought leaders affiliated with the University of British Columbia (UBC) more influence on shaping the character of the region (Chap. 6). Hence, in both Vancouver and Freiburg, the local milieu is linked to environmentalism as a shared societal value which is promoted and further developed through (research) institutions and scientific expertise. Both regions feature alternative milieus that are associated with narratives of localness: environmental activism, alternative lifestyles and municipal governments responsive to these interests. In both regions, the local milieu is also associated with the surrounding natural setting of the Black Forest in Freiburg and the Coastal Mountains and Burrard Inlet in Vancouver. Further, and as interview material from Freiburg and Vancouver illustrates, there are discursive effects of local greening that reinforce these alternative tendencies (Longhurst 2013).

In contrast, the case studies of Brisbane and Luxembourg present a different context that could be interpreted as more strongly influenced by external forces. Both city regions have been more characterised by a culture of resistance rather than change. Early developments in green building in Brisbane can be traced back to the 1950s and 1960s with emerging research activities at the University of Queensland. While early local expertise was built up, particularly around solar energy and solar building design for tropical housing, it nevertheless remained at the margins. Further developments seemed driven to a greater extent by external factors (including the introduction of energy efficiency standards at the national scale in the 1990s and the 2000 Olympics in Sydney that were promoted as the first green Olympics) and affected by changing governments and political agendas described as flip-flop policies. In contrast to Freiburg and Vancouver, the public was not identified as actor group involved in green building transitions, but rather as resistant to change.

Luxembourg’s culture and economy have been depicted as relatively traditional, lacking signs of strong alternative and environmental elements. Perhaps partly due to its relative smallness, connections with and links to other countries and places abroad appear particularly pronounced as expressed through Luxembourg’s role as host city of several EU institutions and its role in the global financial and insurance market. Greening efforts appear primarily driven by the national government’s interest to boost the country’s economic competitiveness and are informed by development strategies employed elsewhere. The public is not characterised as more environmental conscious than in other regions. Contrarily, the large carbon footprint of Luxembourg’s residents is linked to its high per capita income expressed in a higher per capita floor area in housing and strong dependence on individual (private) forms of transportation.

In contrast to Freiburg and Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg appear to lack an alternative milieu characterised by spatially embedded actors, institutions and practices but have also witnessed transitions towards green building despite these being more recent than the other two examples. While the former two are associated with local structures that drive and reinforce green building transitions, they are obviously also influenced and characterised by broader processes and events, as emphasised by the policy mobility literature.

3 Transitions in Relation

Tracing specific pathways of green building transitions reveals not only the interplay between localised, context-specific influences and external ones; it also adds to a better understanding of how these spatial relations and discourses of greening change over time. As outlined above, the literature places emphasis on geographically specific influences, in particular local ones that characterise specific places and allow them to innovate and excel. While innovations and the processes of experimenting and testing can be costly and do not always lead to success, cities willing to take the risk gain knowledge, experience and act as models for others when innovations are successful or unsuccessful (Peck and Theodore 2010). Place is hence emphasised as crucial to driving change. Longhurst (2013) argues how alternative milieus are self-reinforcing and are able to maintain their transformative potential. While the examples of Freiburg and Vancouver suggest trajectories linked to locally rooted, early expressions of counterculture and greening, the way greening is perceived, implemented and instrumentalised in the regions differs and has also changed over time. Similarly, Brisbane and Luxembourg that have been characterised by milieus resistant to change have more recently shown interest in and transitioned towards green building. This section discusses some of the changes in understandings and objectives of green building and associated spatial relations.

Table 10.1 provides an overview over selected neighbourhood developments and buildings in Freiburg, Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg. The neighbourhoods of Rieselfeld and Vauban in Freiburg were responses to the city’s housing shortage and the need and political will to provide affordable, liveable and environmentally sustainable neighbourhoods that included a range of new building and urban design approaches. These were influenced by local knowledge and expertise and included a transport concept around a tramline and bicycling networks, strict energy building standards enforced through sales contracts of building lots and green zones and spaces, including shared gardens (Table 10.1). Both developments also involved citizen and resident participation. While Rieselfeld placed stronger emphasis on social sustainability including provision of social housing, Vauban focused much more on ecological dimensions of green building through voluntarily imposed strict energy standards that reached passive house standards. The OV neighbourhood in Vancouver was influenced by the 2010 Winter Olympics held in the region both in terms of its objectives and conception as well as the timeline for completion. It was conceived locally driven by the political will to create a sustainable neighbourhood development in Southeast False Creek which predated the bid to host the Winter Olympics (see Chap. 6). The International Olympic Committee heightened expectations in terms of environmental sustainability and the city quickly embraced the idea of making the neighbourhood a model for sustainability.

Table 10.1 Examples of innovative building projects in the four case study regions
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The examples of Hollerich Village and Solarwind in Luxembourg and Common Ground in Brisbane confirm assumptions that followers draw largely on ideas, inspirations and models from elsewhere. Both Luxembourgish examples illustrate compliance with a number of (strict) certification schemes from elsewhere. Solarwind is a privately developed green office building boasting triple certification. Hollerich Village is a private development proposal for a predominantly residential inner-city neighbourhood envisioning One Planet standards, which were developed by the NGO Bioregional and have been used for the renown BedZED building. The two examples also illustrate the business case of green building—one of the main rationales and drivers of sustainability transitions in Luxembourg. Yet, the examples are not simply imported models and practices from elsewhere but have been transformed and adjusted to the local context. The examples of Green Square and Common Ground in Brisbane differ, as their primary objective is a social one. Both buildings provide affordable green housing for low-income and disadvantaged people and were created involving NGOs in response to growing concerns around homelessness in the city. Common Ground has been developed to provide housing to the homeless. They also stand out in Brisbane, as green building is typically restricted to office buildings whereas the residential sector has hardly seen any changes.

The examples of neighbourhood developments and building projects suggest that early transitions towards green building are often associated with local institutions, actors and practices as described by the concept of the alternative milieu. But spatial relations are rarely restricted to the local. Green building discourses and roles of green building innovations change over time. External forces may increasingly influence early innovators, while those cities following may develop their own, very specific ways of greening. Freiburg’s Rieselfeld and Vauban neighbourhoods were predominantly shaped by local drivers as briefly outlined above but also utilised ideas from elsewhere, as illustrated by the emergence of building groups, a concept that originated in Berlin. Since the conception of the two neighbourhoods, the local character of the developments has changed to a much more global and outward looking role where the two green neighbourhoods are understood internationally as models and best practice examples reflecting the city’s greening strategy. As such, Vauban today is known far beyond the region as green success model that attracts international interest. One former member of the Vauban project group stated that visitors

come from every corner of the world… Visiting delegations from America, Korea, it’s crazy where they all have heard about Vauban. […] Last year I was outside [in Vauban] with a group from Switzerland, and on the same day, seven other groups were there too. (Frei18)

While continued international attention attests the success of Vauban as model and inspiration for neighbourhood planning and design, concerns have been raised that elevating neighbourhoods like Vauban to best practice examples may ignore challenges and limitations of the development. Freytag et al. (2014) and Mössner (2015), for example, have raised the question whether Vauban in particular meets its original social sustainability objectives including inclusivity and affordability. There is evidence that green neighbourhood developments are dominated by specific constituencies with a risk of ecological gentrification or greenification that may exclude or even disadvantage other groups (Dooling 2008). Further, the shift in Freiburg’s politics from bottom-up to top-down approaches suggests a change in which actors are influencing development in the city.

The OV in Vancouver shows some parallels to the Freiburg examples in terms of its context. Both are situated within places characterised by purported high levels of environmental consciousness but also growth pressures that have led to a housing shortage, both in terms of availability and affordability. In contrast to Freiburg’s Vauban, the OV was perceived not only as opportunity to test green innovations but also as an extrospective showcase. It was envisioned as low-carbon and liveable neighbourhood (in particular to families) that provides open and green space, shops and restaurants together with affordable and social housing, which many felt was undermined by the price of units that were put on the market. Problems related not only to the relatively high costs of housing but also to challenges related to translating green building innovations into practice. In her research on the OV, Westerhoff (2015) gives a detailed account of the lived sustainabilities from the perspective of the residents. She documents how the challenges posed by green building features and technologies from abroad help residents to connect and develop a sense of community. There is evidence here that over the past years, the OV has changed in meaning from flagship development to one that emphasises community life for local residents.

The examples from Luxembourg and Brisbane illustrate how more recent greening is strongly influenced by approaches and models from elsewhere, whether these are certification models or projects (e.g. Common Ground in New York), but also how these have been tailored and changed through local processes. Despite the influences through external models and standards, the cases provide examples of locally produced adaptations. The proposal of Hollerich Village involved participation with local groups to shape the development through engagement with schools, not-for-profits and drop-ins for local residents. The strong role of the private sector, and hence entrepreneurial objectives, also distinguish the cases from those in Vancouver and Freiburg. The two social housing projects in Brisbane highlight social sustainability concerns, which, based on the research presented, appeared to be neglected in the other regions. Green building aspects were seen as a necessity to realise Green Square from an affordability angle:

We wanted to be near public transport, we wanted to be using less electricity, we wanted natural ventilation […] because we have a low income client group. […] Less car parking, less reliance on the motor vehicle, lower maintenance costs. […] We did what we thought made sense and then we find we are getting all these ticks, you know, against environmental sustainability. (BHC representative, Bris30)

Interestingly, green building here is thought of as complementary and supporting, rather than contradictory, to affordability. However, the volatile political context of green building in Brisbane raises the question whether the lack of green or sustainable residential buildings in Brisbane results in not-for-profit initiatives.

The examples of green neighbourhoods and buildings highlight the interplay between localised, context-specific influences and external ones and how these change over time. Green buildings and neighbourhoods reflect changing discourses of greening—the meaning and objectives of these projects are not fixed. How local residents and groups from elsewhere understand, evaluate and identify with these buildings and neighbourhoods may change. Similarly, earlier innovations and leadership are never solely locally produced. A better understanding of sustainability transitions in green building hence requires the tracing of barriers and drivers—both local and external ones—in much more detail and over time.

4 Green Leadership

Green building is now commonly used as strategy by cities that seek to mitigate climate change. But it is not just driven by environmental imperatives. Urban greening and sustainability agendas are influenced by at least two other forces: (1) the need to respond to growing adaptation pressures which may arise, for example, from public pressure, environmental problems or legal requirements (e.g. at higher spatial scales) and (2) the interest in strengthening the city’s competitiveness (Affolderbach and Schulz 2017). In that sense, it “has become not only an environmental but also an economic and political necessity” (Affolderbach and Schulz 2017: 677) for cities to respond to these pressures and to position themselves as green cities or even climate change leaders. The examples of green buildings and neighbourhoods above illustrate to different degrees the endeavours of cities to not only reduce carbon emissions but also to improve the image and competitiveness of the city and to be recognised and known for these achievements.

The use of sustainability and greening in city branding and marketing has increased significantly over the last two decades (Acuto 2012; Anderberg and Clark 2013; Andersson 2016; Béal 2011). Being green has become a quality label that stands for better living and is deliberately used in urban marketing and branding strategies.Footnote 1 In respect to urban policies, McCann (2013: 9) introduces the notion of policy boosterism defined as

the active promotion of locally developed and/or locally successful policies, programs, or practices across wider geographical fields that can then be used to promote local strategies within policy making communities to boost the reputation of the city as well as stakeholders involved in the policy process.

Green marketing, city branding and boosterism are usually outward facing as they seek to present a place in a certain way as expressed through competitive positioning and measuring at the international scale. This extrospective dimension is directed at potential investors, (policy-)tourists and other visitors, policy-makers at different spatial scales and members of specific knowledge communities (McCann 2013). But political endeavours to establish cities as green leaders frequently involve introspective goals that can be aligned with “a multitude of stakeholders and audiences” within the city (Cidell 2015: 567). These are directed at residents and other local constituencies with the aim to increase the identification with and support of these strategies.

Scholars have highlighted ambiguities in the use of the concept of sustainability and highlighted the risks of very different forms and politics of its interpretation and implementation due to the elasticity of the concept (Lombardi et al. 2011; Waas et al. 2011; Hopwood et al. 2005). This similarly relates to concepts of green building where stated objectives emphasise environmental goals (frequently in the form of quantifiable measures such as carbon accounting) and economic growth at the expense of broader environmental and social objectives including in particular aspects of affordability. Studies by While et al. (2004), Long (2016) and others have illustrated how urban greening strategies are hollowed out or changed to cater towards specific interests. Béal (2011), for example, describes how this form of roll-out environmentalism is dominated by certain urban oligarchic groups consisting of urban elites and entrepreneurial actors but excludes other, mostly disadvantaged or silent groups. There is growing evidence that urban sustainability and greening strategies are being used to increase liveability and to boost economic competitiveness and well-being but that benefits and costs of such actions are uneven. This is particularly problematic as objectives of greening and sustainability often provide justifications for development strategies.

Green building transitions in the four case study regions are driven by endeavours to brand and position the cities as green and hence attractive locations for both local businesses and residents as well as external investors, skilled workers and visitors but to different degrees (see Table 10.2). In Freiburg and Vancouver, there has been a shift in objectives and rationales behind greening endeavours from more inward looking, locally produced strategies described above towards much stronger extrospective perspectives over the past two decades. These are largely driven by the municipal governments. As discussed in detail in Chap. 5, Freiburg is branding itself as the Green City which offers a number of successful examples to reconcile soft ecology with hard economics (FWTM 2014). Neoliberal objectives of greening are expressed through expected growth in renewable energy and green technologies, increased tourism through the green and liveable image of the city. The same rhetoric and thinking is evident in Vancouver as, for example, expressed in the Greenest City 2020 Action Plan, Vancouver’s greening strategy that seeks to position Vancouver as world leading city in respect to climate change mitigation and social sustainability (Sect. 6.6; Affolderbach and Schulz 2017; Holden and Larsen 2015). The emphasis on competitive positioning and international rankings risks changing priorities of greening from original outcomes focused on sustainability and greening to ones focused on highest competitiveness as measured through quantifiable approaches. The latter may motivate cities to chase for numbers following the mechanisms of ranking or certification tools (e.g. when focusing on highly weighted indicators to the detriment of other crucial dimensions). In both cases, the shift towards more extrospective strategies is expressed through neoliberal and entrepreneurial aspects of greening as well as an increase in approaches using quantifiable measures for comparability such as carbon accounting.

Table 10.2 Dimensions of green leadership in Freiburg, Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg
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Luxembourg’s greening endeavours are much more recent and are characterised by a similar political will to position the city and country internationally to attract investment in the green economy in order to diversify and strengthen the national economy (Table 10.2). Greening in Luxembourg consists primarily of technological fixes in respect to reduced energy consumption through energy requirement targets introduced over the past 10 years. Aspects of lived sustainabilities linked to changes in consumer habits and broader social changes only occur at the margin and do not feature in the dominant debate. Introspective dimensions of the new political positioning relate to issues of energy dependency and security, employment generation together with increased liveability and sustained economic growth. Green building transitions in Luxembourg are also driven by private initiatives emphasising the entrepreneurial dimension. Respondents suggested that green building allows increased economic returns. While green technology may be more expensive, green buildings in Luxembourg can be easily sold at a premium rate, which helps strengthen the business case of greening.

In contrast to the other three cities, and since the election of a new council in 2008, Brisbane City Council is not currently the core driver of greening in the city. While the 1990s and 2000s saw a progressive council in terms of greening that introduced, for example, financial incentive schemes for green building and the Plan for Action on Climate Change and Energy released by the Council in 2007. The latter includes similar objectives of community engagement and liveability as Vancouver’s GCAP. Green building has also been largely driven by the supra-regional Green Star building rating system, which was introduced in 2002. Green building in Brisbane exists as a business-driven phenomenon in the commercial building sector paired with the niche examples of not-for-profit collaborations mentioned above. These illustrate that despite, or maybe because of, the lack of political will, there is room for experimentation that allows sustainability debates to refocus around social inclusivity and provisioning of affordable housing away from neoliberal agendas and carbon calculus.

5 Mobile Greening

The four cities present different transition pathways of green building that illustrate the relational character of local greening. Green building transitions can also be analysed based on the different articulations, adaptations and assemblages of policies, models and knowledge across space. Table 10.3 provides a list of characteristics of mobile models, policies and knowledge for each of the case study regions but does not claim to be exhaustive. Local projects, innovations and ideas can offer learning opportunities and models for elsewhere. While Freiburg attracts interest from around the world, Vancouver’s role as leader is largely restricted to the North American continent despite its claims of global leadership. Brisbane and Luxembourg largely adopt and adapt practices and knowledge from elsewhere but remain primarily influenced by the national (Australian) and European context.

Table 10.3 Characteristics of mobile policies, knowledge and practice exchange in Freiburg, Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg
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Green building innovations that can be mobilised and transferred or that have been imported, influenced or adapted from elsewhere are distinguished into three categories (Table 10.3): (1) policies, regulations and strategy papers as discussed in the policy mobility literature, (2) models that encompass all non-policy related innovations including buildings and neighbourhood developments, organisational, institutional and other arrangements such as certification bodies and (3) locally held and generated expert knowledge and experience mostly related to embedded institutions and alternative milieus. As discussed above, all of these are understood as relational processes, hence never just local nor exclusively from elsewhere.

In terms of policies, Freiburg’s energy standards have been frequently highlighted as crucial to the city’s transition in green building. The same applies to Vancouver’s building bylaws. Models of green building are most visual in building experiments and flagship developments. Rieselfeld and Vauban are emblematic for new neighbourhood developments that are largely seen as successful models to be replicated or inform developments elsewhere. Vancouver’s Olympic Village is both an example of imported practices and knowledge as well as inspiration for new developments. Freiburg also provides pioneer projects for retrofitting (Buggi 50).

Certification standards have played a central role in establishing and communicating green building in Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg and to a lesser extent in Freiburg (e.g. passive house standard) and have been widely adopted and enshrined in local policies and regulations. Most certification standards are designed within specific context (e.g. Australia and New Zealand for Green Star, North America for LEED, see Table 6.1) but provide a high level of mobility and transferability. There is, however, growing criticism related to measurable and quantified approaches. Both in Vancouver and Brisbane, respondents questioned whether LEED and Green Star, respectively, delivered highest standards and best outcomes. The certification tools only measure what they are designed to measure and may restrict experimentation and endeavours to push set boundaries. Respondents shared concerns that the certification schemes resulted in a measurement of compliance with set standards rather than measurement of greening in terms of reducing negative environmental, social and economic impacts and optimising gains. This translated into a tendency to chase points and changes the core of green building objectives from achieving best outcomes to compliance with set targets and regulations.

In terms of locally generated or held knowledge, expertise and experience, Freiburg and Brisbane share know-how focused on energy-efficient technologies which are largely associated with universities (Brisbane) and research institutions (Freiburg) as well as a number of key individuals. It is the context, particularly in political terms, that has led to a durable knowledge community in Freiburg, while Brisbane’s changing environmental politics seem to have destabilised the knowledge cluster. Vancouver’s leadership in green building is probably most strongly expressed in the area of urban design. This is reflected through the urban form described as Vancouverism but also through dedicated groups working on holistic approaches to neighbourhood design within the City of Vancouver and UBC. Vancouver also boasts experience with public engagement and collaborative approaches to sustainability. Luxembourg seems to lack locally anchored know-how related to green building. This can partially be explained by the relatively small size of the country but also by its industrial legacy. However, recent efforts to invest into public and private research (e.g. through the creation of a university and dedicated research centres) aim at improving the country’s knowledge base. More generally, Luxembourg has proved a high level of adaptability and political will to offer economic opportunities for highly specialised sectors that is now directed towards green technologies and building.

One last aspect that has been neglected from a transition studies perspective relates to actors as carriers and drivers of knowledge and change. Table 10.3 identifies a number of key institutions and actors that underline the interplay of government, private and community actors. The analysis of the four cases highlighted the centrality of individual actors as thought leaders and innovators in particular during periods and in regions with high levels of innovativeness. In Vancouver and Freiburg, green building experiments have been strongly associated with a number of key individuals. Early experiments in Brisbane were equally linked to a few experts, while recent flagship developments in Luxembourg have been conceived and developed by dedicated private investors. These individuals have been equally central to the development and generation of green building policies, models and knowledge emphasising the role of actor-centred and qualitative research in understanding sustainability transitions.

Analysis of spatial and temporal dimensions can enrich our understanding of green building transitions. Spatially sensitive and actor-centred analyses in particular and as promote in the policy mobility literature contribute to a more nuanced understanding of processes of learning, adaptation and mutation and the role of individual actors and actor groups. They also help to understand the relational character of localised processes of innovation. Green building transitions are temporal processes, and a focus on spatial dimensions provides insights into broader trends and changes over time. Based on the findings from the four case studies, green building transitions have changed in nature and objectives. All four cases revealed a shift towards more competitive approaches of greening linked to target-based, quantitative approaches to reduce carbon emissions, economic opportunism and growth imperatives and a neglect of social dimensions of greening where social sustainability can be seen as a niche phenomenon within the green building sector. Generally, and in line with other findings in the literature (e.g. Gibbs and O’Neill 2015), green building transitions in Freiburg, Vancouver, Brisbane and Luxembourg suggest incremental rather than radical change.