This volume presents a novel framework to understand urban climate co-benefits in India, that is, tackling climate change and achieving sustainable development goals in cities. It utilizes methods and tools from several assessment frameworks to scientifically evaluate sector co-benefits for informed decision making. The co-benefits approach can lead to significant improvements in the way societies use environmental resources and distribute their outputs. The volume discusses four main themes: (1) Concepts and theories on cities and climate co-benefits; (2) Contextualizing co-benefit issues across spatial scales and sectors; (3) Sectoral analyses of co-benefits in energy, transport, buildings, waste, and biodiversity, and (4) Innovations and reforms needed to promote co-benefits in cities. The discussions are based on empirical research conducted in Indian cities and aligned with the international discourse on the 2030 UN Development Agenda and New Urban Agenda created at the UN-Habitat III in 2016. The analyses and recommendations in this volume are of considerable interest to policy experts, scholars and researchers of urban and regional studies, geography, public policy, international development/law, economics, development planning, environmental planning, climate change, energy studies, and so on.

The authors of this volume provide a window into what influences the quality of life, why people live longer, and why we are relatively better off compared to decades ago. While the potential ways of measuring life quality are abundant, understanding what causes improvement requires careful study and consideration. This volume provides useful insight into these challenges and helps to highlight a clear and important separation between wellbeing and standard of living, both relevant to assessing the quality of life. Standard of living refers to the material welfare of a group. Wellbeing, on the other hand, encapsulates harder-to-measure subjective preferences. Together they help us to understand the quality of life of certain groups at specific times, and in specific communities.

The fields of intelligent systems and sustainability have been gaining momentum in the research community. They have drawn interest in such research fields as computer science, information technology, electrical engineering, and other associated engineering disciples. The promise of intelligent systems applied to sustainability is becoming a reality due to the recent advancements in the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, blockchain, deep learning, and machine learning. The emergence of intelligent systems has given rise to a wide range of techniques and algorithms using an ensemble approach to implement novel solutions for complex problems associated with sustainability. Intelligent Systems and Sustainable Computational Models: Concepts, Architecture, and Practical Applications explores this ensemble approach towards building a sustainable future. It explores novel solutions for such pressing problems as smart healthcare ecosystems, energy efficient distributed computing, affordable renewable resources, mitigating financial risks, monitoring environmental degradation, and balancing climate conditions. The book helps researchers to apply intelligent systems to computational sustainability models to propose efficient methods, techniques, and tools. The book covers such areas as: Intelligent and adaptive computing for sustainable energy, water, and transportation networks Blockchain for decentralized systems for sustainable applications, systems, and infrastructure IoT for sustainable critical infrastructure Explainable AI (XAI) and decision-making models for computational sustainability Sustainable development using edge computing, fog computing and cloud computing Cognitive intelligent systems for e-learning Artificial Intelligence and machine learning for large scale data Green computing and cyber physical systems Real-time applications in healthcare, agriculture, smart cities, and smart governance. By examining how intelligent systems can build a sustainable society, the book presents systems solutions that can benefit researchers and professionals in such fields as information technology, health, energy, agricultural, manufacturing, and environmental protection.

In the dynamic field of modern business, where cloud computing has become the primary focus of operations, a pressing issue arises – the persistent concerns of security, privacy, and trust in cloud environments. Organizations find themselves at a crossroads, caught between the immense benefits of cloud adoption and the escalating challenges of safeguarding sensitive data and maintaining user trust. The need for a comprehensive and practical guide to navigate these intricate landscapes has never been more critical. Analyzing and Mitigating Security Risks in Cloud Computing is a groundbreaking guidebook tailored to address the very challenges that organizations face in securing their cloud infrastructures. With a focus on real-world examples, case studies, and industry best practices, the book equips its readers with actionable insights and tools to fortify their cloud security posture. From understanding the fundamentals of cloud computing to addressing emerging trends and implementing robust security strategies, the book serves as a holistic solution to bridge the knowledge gap and empower professionals at every level.

Rapid regeneration of city areas has placed the quality of urban design high on public and policy agendas worldwide. Planning for Urban Quality examines the achievement of quality in the urban environment, in a planning context. Tracing urban design from its roots, the authors draw on both historical and current practices to examine the key physical, political and economic forces at play and the social pressures and impacts brought about by both failures and achievements in urban design. This highly illustrated critique of towns and cities draws on examples from across Western Europe, South Africa and USA to examine both public and private sector development practices, controls and fiscal policies within a diverse range of localities. The authors indicate the need for a reinstitution of region-provincial approaches, for closer co-ordination bewteen sectors, and revised fiscal policies in planning and development in order to enhance the quality of urban social experience and environments. Providing a deeper understanding of the many diverse strands of Urban Quality, the authors provide a firm basis from which to analyse urban planning achievements and to assess the relevance and value of urban scapes.

Based on a major research project undertaken by a team at the Institute of Market Economy, Development Research Center of the State Council of China, a project which included extensive survey research, and involved also many international scholars including researchers at the World Economic Forum Research Center and OECD, this book explores the possible future trajectories for urbanization in China. The book argues, drawing on examples from around the world, that technological advances have a huge impact on the exact nature of urbanization, and that institutions and policies have a significant role too, institutional arrangements such as modern education systems, patents and intellectual protection, and modern corporate systems. The book goes on to assess how current technological advances are likely to affect future urbanization and concludes by setting out how China should seize the opportunities from new technological advances and the associated transformation and upgrading of economic and social structures, and coordinate the development of "technology, factors of production, industry and institutions" as an integrated engine for high quality future urbanization.