Stakeholder knowledge
Capture planning priorities, local knowledge, concerns and alternative visions from policymakers, practitioners and communities.
Urban planning for a climate-neutral future
Carbon-Neutral Futures Explorer
An AI-supported urban decision platform for exploring pathways to carbon neutrality.
Cities need to make connected choices about growth, mobility, buildings, land, nature and human behaviour. The Explorer brings these choices into a shared planning pathway, helping decision-makers examine how alternative urban futures could affect emissions, carbon sequestration and wider planning outcomes.
From shared priorities to spatial scenarios and measurable outcomes
Illustrative future-city visual: project team
The planning challenge
Carbon neutrality is a spatial planning challenge
Urban climate actions interact. New development changes travel demand. Transport investment influences where people and businesses locate. Zoning affects growth patterns. Green infrastructure stores carbon, manages water and changes access to nature.
Policies and behavioural responses shape whether interventions achieve their intended effects. Decisions made separately can miss these connections. A shared planning environment allows cities to examine them together.
A shared evidence base
What the Explorer brings together
Open spatial data
Use available land, infrastructure, environmental and socioeconomic data to establish the planning context across different cities.
Urban futures simulation
Explore where future development, conservation and restoration could occur under different planning assumptions.
Connected assessments
Examine implications across buildings, transportation, green infrastructure, zoning and policy, and behavioural responses.
Decision-ready evidence
Compare spatial patterns, carbon outcomes and planning trade-offs in a form that supports discussion and revision.
Social and spatial context
Land cover tells only part of the story
Residential mobility patterns reveal how urban change affects different groups. Bringing this evidence into the same planning conversation helps make distributional effects visible.
The purpose is to make alternative futures visible, comparable and open to discussion.
Planning pathway
From a planning question to a revised urban pathway
The Explorer organizes planning as an iterative process. Planners and stakeholders define the problem, translate priorities into assumptions, simulate change, assemble interventions, compare outcomes and revise the pathway.
01Define
Frame the planning question
Clarify the target year, geographic scope, climate objective and decisions under consideration. Bring planners, policymakers and other stakeholders into a shared problem frame.
What needs to change, where, by when—and for whom?02Envision
Describe the future to explore
Turn stakeholder visions and policy language into explicit scenario assumptions. AI can help organize qualitative input and connect planning narratives with spatial parameters.
Stakeholder priority → scenario assumption03Simulate
Explore urban and landscape change
Combine existing conditions, development demand, accessibility, planning restrictions, historic land cover and stakeholder-defined assumptions.
Reference landscape → possible patterns of change04Intervene
Assemble coordinated measures
Explore measures across connected systems, from compact development and building renewal to transport, nature-based solutions, spatial policy and behaviour.
Illustrative functionality05Compare
Examine outcomes and trade-offs
Compare alternative futures using a consistent set of spatial, carbon, accessibility and planning indicators.
One evidence structure across every scenario06Revise
Improve the pathway through discussion
Review results with stakeholders, identify trade-offs, adjust assumptions and test a revised combination of measures as evidence and priorities change.
Comparison becomes the next decision
Illustrative workshop visual: project team
Concept interface
Translate priorities into scenario settings
Envision and Intervene connect policy narratives and stakeholder input with structured measures and model inputs.
Simulate
Explore urban and landscape change
Establish a reference landscape, then examine where development, conservation or restoration could occur.
Explore historic land cover ↗
Compare
Bring interventions into one spatial view
Compare multiple nature-based solutions without separating them from the wider urban pathway.
Planning is iterative: each comparison creates a clearer basis for the next decision.
Connected urban systems
One urban future, five connected systems
Carbon-neutral planning requires more than a single model or intervention. The Explorer connects several systems around a shared spatial scenario so planners can see reinforcement and trade-offs.
01 / Buildings
Where can renewal and low-carbon development contribute most?
Explore the spatial distribution of buildings, jobs and activities. Define renewal areas and compare future development forms and densities.
Concept visualisationDetailed building assessment: TBD
02 / Transportation
How do urban form and mobility choices influence emissions?
Examine how development location, accessibility and last-mile choices affect transportation outcomes, including improved connections, mode shifts and compact growth.
Explore the Last-Mile tool ↗
03 / Green infrastructure
Where can nature-based solutions provide combined value?
Explore green roofs, corridors, streetscape vegetation and access improvements while considering carbon, biodiversity, heat, water and access to nature together.
Open the Nature-Based Solutions Dashboard ↗
04 / Zoning and policy
How do plans, protection and conservation shape change?
Represent spatial policies as scenario conditions. Compare simulated development with established plans and incorporate protected or conserved land into the policy baseline.
Open the conserved-land assessment ↗
05 / Behavioural nudges
How might people and organizations respond?
Connect policy measures with uptake assumptions, translate stakeholder concerns into scenario parameters and revise expectations as evidence becomes available.
Concept interfaceBehavioural module: TBD
Each module contributes evidence to the same planning pathway.
Comparing futures
Compare possible futures before choices are fixed
Scenarios help planners examine how different combinations of growth, policy and investment could shape the city. They are structured explorations informed by explicit assumptions.
Shared comparison workspaceIllustrative scenario values
Current trajectory
Development and travel patterns continue broadly along existing trends, with currently adopted measures.
Expand map ↗- Spatial change
- Dispersed growth
- Carbon balance
- Current measures
- Accessibility
- Uneven access
- Green provision
- Existing network
- Planning compatibility
- Adopted plans
- Target-year pathway
- Incremental
Compact growth
More development is directed toward existing centres, services and public-transport connections.
Expand map ↗- Spatial change
- Centres prioritised
- Carbon balance
- Lower travel demand
- Accessibility
- Services closer
- Green provision
- Targeted provision
- Planning compatibility
- Plan-led
- Target-year pathway
- Accelerated
Green-connected growth
Development is coordinated with green infrastructure, ecosystem protection, active mobility and targeted renewal.
Expand map ↗- Spatial change
- Connected pattern
- Carbon balance
- Emissions + sinks
- Accessibility
- Active links
- Green provision
- Expanded network
- Planning compatibility
- Priorities aligned
- Target-year pathway
- Coordinated
Landscape restoration
What if restoration expands?
Urban climate pathways can include ecosystem restoration alongside changes to buildings, transport and development.
Evidence across citiesOpen six-city comparison
These tools support exploratory scenario assessment. Their outputs should be considered alongside local evidence, planning processes and stakeholder knowledge.
Existing tools and resources
Explore the tools behind the planning pathway
The Explorer brings together existing applications, project examples and learning materials. Each resource opens at its source in a new tab.
Integrated urban tools
mit-dusp-nbs.github.io
Nature-Based Solutions Dashboard
Explore spatial indicators and the allocation and visualization of urban nature-based solutions.
Open dashboard ↗
leam.illinois.edu
Last-Mile Transportation Tool
Examine last-mile transportation choices and associated emissions.
Project-owned fallback visualOpen tool ↗
leam.uiuc.edu
LEAM land-use modelling
Learn about the Land-use Evolution and Impact Assessment Model and its applications.
Project-owned fallback visualVisit website ↗Ecosystem and carbon scenarios
sequestration.web.illinois.edu
Conserved and protected land
Examine conserved land, protection programmes and estimated carbon sequestration.
Open assessment ↗
sequestration.web.illinois.edu
Historic land cover
Compare historic and current land-cover patterns and use the historic landscape as a scenario reference.
Open explorer ↗
sequestration.web.illinois.edu
Restoring forests
Compare forest-restoration scenarios and their estimated conservation and carbon outcomes.
Open scenarios ↗
sequestration.web.illinois.edu
Restoring wetlands
Explore historic and current wetlands and the implications of wetland restoration.
Open scenarios ↗Projects, methods and learning
leam.illinois.edu
Sangamon model tour
Follow a guided introduction to a previous LEAM land-use application.
Project-owned fallback visualStart the tour ↗
geoscilab.web.illinois.edu
LEAM project collection
Explore examples of spatial modelling, planning-support and environmental applications.
View projects ↗plone.rehearsal.uiuc.edu
LEAM model technical guide
Learn how the land-use model is configured and used.
PDF · legacy endpointOpen technical guide ↗
Adapted with AI from an original image by StockCake; used with permission.
About the project
Research shaped around practical planning needs
The Carbon-Neutral Futures Explorer is being developed through AI-Driven Sustainable Spatial Planning: Advancing Climate-Neutral Cities through Digital Innovation (2025–2028).
The project combines research on climate action, AI-supported urban planning and nature-based solutions to support cities in developing effective climate strategies through spatial planning. It builds on the earlier AI-powered knowledge integration to Carbon-neutral Cities project and extends the decision-support approach for large, medium and small urban contexts.
The tools are being co-developed with planners and other stakeholders so that scenario assumptions, model results and visualizations respond to practical planning needs.
Read about the project at KTH ↗ContactZahra Kalantari
Professor, KTH Royal Institute of Technology · Project Principal Investigator
Project consortium
Research and planning partners
Led by KTH Royal Institute of Technology through WaterCentre@KTH, with research and planning partners across the consortium.
Funded by
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