Leadership

Dublin ranks 21 out of 30 in Green City Index

08.12.2009
Dublin has ranked 21st out of 30 European cities in terms of environmental performance on a Green City index compiled by Siemens.

The European Green City Index measures and rates the environmental performance of 30 leading cities from 30 European countries, as well as their commitment to reducing their environmental impact.

The study evaluates the 30 cities in eight categories: CO2 emissions, energy, buildings, transportation, water, air quality, waste and land use, and environmental governance.

Dublin poor in most categories
While not doing too badly in terms of air quality with a fourth place ranking, Dublin scored badly in the majority of the other categories including carbon emissions, transport and buildings.

The index shows Dublin ranks 19th for CO2 emissions with the city producing 9.72 tonnes of CO2 per head annually, which is nearly twice the 30-city average of 5.2 tonnes.

Dublin is also ranked last out of all the European cities for transport, its worst performance. Both the length of the city’s public transport network and the extent of its cycle lanes are well below the index average. The study also shows less than 20pc of people in Dublin take public transport to work, which is about half the index average of 42pc, with nearly 61pc using private cars.

Dublin’s overall score in the European Green City Index was 53.98 out of 100, which meant it was sandwiched between Athens in 22^nd place and Bratislava in 21^st place.

Scandanavian cities top rankings
The top three cities in the Green City rankings were all Scandinavian. Appropriately enough, given that it is the base for the United Nations global conference on climate change, Denmark’s Copenhagen is the greenest major city in Europe.

Copenhagen is followed by Stockholm in second place and Oslo in third.

Also placing in the top 10 is Vienna in fourth place, followed by Amsterdam at No 5, Zurich at No 6, Helsinki at No 7, Berlin at No 8, and Brussels and Paris in ninth and tenth positions respectively.

Eastern European cities tend to rank lower
Eastern European cities generally place lower in the Green City rankings. This is mostly down to a comparatively low GDP and historic burdens, including the lack of attention paid to environmental protection in previous decades.

However, in terms of public transport, such cities often score above average. For example, Kiev, which is ranked in last place out of all the 30 cities, is estimated to have the highest percentage of people using public transportation to commute.