While the Middle East does not seem a likely “hub” for an eco-friendly city makeover, the city of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates is stepping up to the challenge in order to combat their title of the world’s “grubbiest” people.  This small nation produces enough wealth so that its citizens drive gas-guzzling cars and keep their air conditioning on in every building, thereby producing many emissions that have the potential to harm the atmosphere.  Not to mention the fact that it is predicted that their supply of oil will run out within the next century, the Abu Dhabians seemed pressed to come up with a solution.

It seems like a stretch that a Middle Eastern town would be able to consolidate their revenues in order to preserve the environment and available energy resources, but in 2006, Abu Dhabi created the Masdar Initiative which was put into place to solve many of these problems.  Many hope that these enactments into the community will turn the city into a green powerhouse in which clean technology will reign over all, and new environmental technologies will be discovered.  Masdar city hopes to be the most energy efficient of this new plan, with innovative technologies instated that will prove to reduce emissions.  The buildings will become more energy-efficient, water will be recycled, and plants will be put in place which will require much less water than the current lawns and flowers that dominate Abu Dhabi.  Cars will also be banned from this area, causing citizens to walk or take new “pods” that will be similar to metro cars.

While eco-friendly ways of life have become more prevalent in recent years because of the increased attention paid to the ozone layer and environmental deficiencies, many major cities around the world have not gone to the extent that Abu Dhabi is currently reaching toward.  Telling a city like New York that they would no longer have public transportation, but would be confined to “pods” would raise a serious of protests rather than interest in this new “green” movement.  It is disheartening that this type of leading city cannot follow in the footsteps of such a new modern city in order to combat the ever approaching environmental disaster that is always looming in the distance.  Global warming has been a topic of hot debate for years now and while standards have been put into place to control emissions, forests are still being cut down daily and bigger cars are constantly being created that produce major emissions.  Abu Dhabi has resigned itself to protecting its energy resources as well as discovering new methods from which to function, installing solar panels on every rooftop, which will later cause the city to produce more energy that it will consume.  This type of innovative eco-friendly technology should serve as a role model for the rest of the world’s major cities in the effort to one day convert to this mode of thinking.

This post was contributed by writer Meredith Walker. You can read more of her work here.