Why the energy transition needs a new approach to urban planning

When I began my career as an architect, I learnt that the most consequential decisions about a building are often made long before construction begins. Its orientation, relationship with the surrounding environment, choice of materials and use of natural resources determine how efficiently it will perform for decades. Years later, as <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/tags/sustainability">sustainability</a> director at <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/tags/masdar">Masdar</a> City in Abu Dhabi, I saw this principle applied on a larger scale.

We were exploring how an entire urban community could be designed around sustainability, integrating clean <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/tags/energy">energy</a>, efficient buildings, innovative technologies and thoughtful urban planning. Today, after years in international energy diplomacy, I am more convinced than ever that the same principle applies to the global energy transition: the decisions we make about our cities today will determine our energy future for generations.

This connection is particularly relevant as world leaders continue to convene in Antalya for Cop31, which began last Monday. The messages emerging from the Leaders’ Summit are clear. <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/tags/weather">Climate</a> ambition must translate into concrete action. Energy security and economic prosperity must advance alongside decarbonisation, while resilience must become a central pillar of how we plan for a changing climate.

Türkiye’s Cop31 presidency has identified electrification, sustainable buildings and climate-resilient cities as key priorities. These are not separate conversations. They are fundamentally interconnected. For too long, energy policy and urban development have been approached as separate disciplines. Energy policymakers focused on power generation capacity, grids and emissions. Urban planners consider buildings, transportation, infrastructure and public spaces.

Yet cities are where these systems converge, and where the consequences of getting them right, or wrong, become most visible. A city can invest in renewable electricity, but if its buildings remain inefficient, its transport systems depend on fossil fuels and its infrastructure cannot withstand extreme weather, the benefits will remain limited. Equally, a city designed to reduce energy demand through passive cooling, efficient construction, integrated public transport and intelligent infrastructure can make the transition to <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/tags/renewable-energy">clean energy</a> more affordable and achievable.

The cleanest unit of energy is often the one we never need to consume. This was among the most important lessons from the early development of Masdar City. Sustainability was never simply about installing solar panels. It was about rethinking the relationship between buildings, people, energy and the environment. In a region where cooling is essential for much of the year, the orientation of streets, shading, building design and efficient cooling technologies are not merely architectural details.

They are also energy decisions. And increasingly, they are decisions about resilience, too. Climate change is testing urban infrastructure through extreme heat, flooding, water stress and growing pressure on electricity systems. At the Leaders’ Summit, the urgency of strengthening adaptation and protecting vulnerable communities was emphasised. For cities, resilience cannot be treated as an additional feature introduced after infrastructure has been built.

It must be embedded from the beginning. That means designing electricity networks capable of integrating distributed renewable energy and storage. It means protecting essential services from disruptions, managing water and energy together, and ensuring buildings remain functional during extreme weather. It also means recognising that resilience is ultimately about people. A reliable electricity supply keeps hospitals operating, businesses productive and homes safe.

Affordable energy improves quality of life. Well-designed public spaces and efficient transportation connect communities to economic opportunities. The transition must therefore be measured not only in gigawatts installed or emissions avoided, but also by the tangible improvements it brings to everyday life. One important development at Cop31 is the renewed emphasis on electrification. The presidency’s proposed ambition to increase electricity’s share of global energy consumption to 35 per cent by 2035 reflects the recognition that clean electricity can transform transport, buildings and industry.

But electrification alone is not enough. We must ensure that electricity is increasingly clean, that grids are modernised to accommodate rising demand, and that the infrastructure supporting this transformation is resilient, affordable and accessible. This is where cities become essential partners in national energy strategies. The UAE offers lessons from its own experience. From the early vision of Masdar City to large-scale solar developments, investment in advanced infrastructure and the integration of digital technologies, the country has demonstrated the importance of combining long-term ambition with practical implementation.

The UAE Consensus, reached at Cop28 in 2023, helped establish a global direction, including the commitment to triple renewable energy capacity and double the rate of energy efficiency improvements by 2030. The challenge now is translating these commitments into changes experienced across economies and communities. And nowhere is that challenge more tangible than in our cities. There is also an important question of equity. Many of the world’s fastest-growing cities are in developing economies, where governments must expand access to housing, energy, transportation and essential services while adapting to increasingly severe climate risks.

These countries should not be forced to choose between development and sustainability. International climate finance, technology co-operation and capacity-building must help cities invest in infrastructure that is both low-carbon and resilient. Integrating sustainability during planning is often far less costly than retrofitting poorly designed infrastructure decades later. Cop31 has an opportunity to advance this agenda by connecting global energy commitments with the investment and planning decisions shaping urban development.

This requires closer co-operation between national governments, municipalities, financial institutions, energy companies, architects and urban planners. It also requires reconsidering how success is measured, moving beyond individual projects towards the performance and resilience of entire urban systems. My journey from architecture to sustainable urban development and international energy diplomacy has reinforced one conviction: meaningful transformation happens when we stop treating interconnected challenges in isolation.

Clean energy is not simply about how we generate electricity. It is also about how we design economies, build communities and create opportunities for future generations. As leaders negotiate in Antalya, we should remember that the true measure of progress will not be found only in conference declarations. It will be found in the homes we build, the streets we design, the infrastructure we invest in and the cities we leave to the next generation.

The future of clean energy will not be determined by how much renewable power we produce alone, but by how intelligently we use it to shape the world around us.