Public Awareness of Low Carbon Ecological City Construction
低碳生态城市建设改造技术公众认知研究

Building low carbon eco-cities is an important strategy in economic transitioning and rapid urbanization. Green retrofitting technology targeting existing communities is pivotal; however, there is a lack of research into the public awareness of this technology. We conducted a survey on 29-30 March 2012 on the public awareness of the content, methods and techniques of low carbon eco-city construction. Our questionnaires and semi-structured interviews focused on the three aspects of ‘necessity’, ‘methodology’ and ‘existing problems’. Regarding green building planning and existing community retrofitting, the survey investigated people’s understanding and recognition. Regarding urban microcirculation rebuilding, the survey concentrated on ‘key technology’, ‘micro-circulation theory’, ‘detail technical problem’ and ‘key practices’. There were 141 effective questionnaires recovered out of 160 during the survey period. The results indicate that it is generally agreed that the techniques of low carbon eco-city planning differ from those of conventional urban planning. Differences are believed to exist in control modes, planning objectives, guiding ideology, information means, planning processes, planning details and security systems. De-carbonizing schemes targeting existing communities should include the following five aspects: transformation of energy systems, environmental remediation, historical preservation, architectural renewal and preservation, and resettlement. Over 90% of respondents believed that green building large-scale planning should involve social and human factors such as convenient public service facilities, accessible public spaces, community livability, completeness of infrastructure facilities, life satisfaction, cultural heritage, architecture openness and job opportunities. Nearly three in ten respondents (27%) felt that the government should lead the ecological reconstruction for low-carbon communities, while 13.5% and 10.8% of respondents indicated that government should be advocate and sponsor, respectively. Overall, our findings show that transformed urban development has become a global trend. Low carbon eco-city construction must follow Chinese traditional culture and consider the local circumstances and follow the principle of low environmental impact. Awareness of microcirculation techniques was hierarchical and followed the pattern: micro-degradation, micro-energy, micro-impact, micro-regeneration, micro-transportation, micro-venture, micro-greenland and micro-regulation.