ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we examine how the imperative of climate protection has been interpreted and implemented in Newcastle upon Tyne. Newcastle is a large conurbation in the northeast of England. Traditionally, the city has been reliant on industries associated with the docks and river, such as ship-building and chemicals, as well as the nearby coalfields. As these industries declined during the 1970s and 1980s, the city and surrounding areas experienced considerable levels of economic and social deprivation. In the 1990s, substantial inward investment and regeneration within the city led to increasing prosperity and employment. In the first section, we document the history of Newcastle’s involvement with energy management, and their membership of the CCP programme. While considerable attention has been devoted to the issue, action has been mainly confined to corporate energy efficiency measures, and the CCP programme has had little direct influence on policies or practices. We then examine how climate protection policies and measures have been developed within one particular sector: land-use planning. Over the past decade, land-use planning has been seen as a key instrument through which to implement sustainable development in the UK. We outline the background and rationale to these debates, focusing on moves to address urban energy consumption, and analyse how they have taken shape within the planning process in Newcastle. We argue that although the need for cities to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases has been articulated as a critical component of urban sustainability, competing interpretations of sustainable development, which privilege economic growth over environmental protection, have restricted the scope for local action on climate protection. In conclusion, we reflect on the impacts of the CCP programme in Newcastle, and the implications of our findings for urban sustainability and the governance of climate change.
