Energy performance in urban projects : accessibility and mobility integration in respect to éco-quartier projects. Case study : Ile-de-France region

Abstract This research is about energy conservation in relation to mobility and more specifically the effects of built-up environment on energy consumption due to transport. The main focus of the research is on the characteristics of éco-quartiers projects (ecological sustainable neighbourhoods) and their effects on urban sprawl and energy consumption due to mobility in Ile-de-France region. Éco-quartier projects are aimed to enhance urban environment through integration of urban and natural landscapes, using renewable energies, new architecture methods and using low level of automobile. These factors beside other sustainability characteristics turned éco-quartiers into the new generation of sustainable neighbourhoods. Nevertheless, evidence about the éco-quartiers in Ile-de-France still leaves some key questions unanswered: 1. Has the criterion of sustainability been taken into account in the development of éco-quartiers (more precisely in the case of localization)? 2. How have these éco-quartiers been affecting urban sprawl on the local and regional scales during the current decade? 3. By considering the issues such as energy consumption, gas emissions and pollution, due to transport, how the development of éco-quartiers can impact on these variables through daily mobility and transport? The purpose of this research is shedding a critical light on éco-quartier projects through questioning their actual energy performance from the mobility point of view, depending on their location, accessibility to public transport, distance to destination, diversity and density. Furthermore, the results of this research will discover the adaptation of éco-quartiers with first the sustainability approaches presented in the ministry of sustainable development in France and then the general contents of sustainable urbanism movement.