The recurring summer phenomenon of scrub and forest wild fires (or are they so wild ?) encroaching on heavily built up areas raises serious questions involving a number of URBACT priorities. Most recently Athens, but also in Portugal, Italy, California and Australia this year, the intense threat of fire has focussed attention on climate change and the condition of the urban-rural interface. Particularly in the case of Athens we might ask ourselves, to what extent is uncontrolled and almost unprecedented urban sprawl a contributory factor in facilitating such “natural” disasters? Does this type of conflagration provide an additional argument to revisit metropolitan land-use management strategies as suggested by the URBACT project LUMASEC. It may well be a signal to extract an old rabbit from the magicians hat. Could an effectively managed and economically adapted green belt policy still function as an instrument to regulate development in the urban fringe. A review of options in this sense might be profitable, based on evaluation of green belt implementation, documenting advantages and potential as well as highlighting undoubted limitations in past configurations.
Philip Stein
Forest & Brush fires generate more than CO2, they also produce extreme amounts of Thermal Energy. One forest fire can actually produce the same amount of CO2 as all the cars and trucks on the planet produce over 3/4 of a year. Other factors too.
There is a system out there that has something that can help detect and control these mega fires before they get out of control.
You can watch a documentary presentation about this at this web address http://www.youtube.com/globalresponsegrp
Lets help them make a difference, pass this on to everyone you know so that more people are aware of the problem not just form a few small news stories, let’s wake people up and get some action going globally. Please pass this along in your blogging.