One Planet City Challenge (OPCC) aims to mobilise action and support from cities in the global transition towards a climate friendly future, and to stimulate ambitious plans for low carbon development, as well as enhancing the use of sustainable, renewable and energy efficient solutions.
OPCC, earlier called the Earth Hour City Challenge (EHCC), is now a global biennial challenge that is designed to highlight and reward cities that are willing and prepared to make substantial long-term efforts toward sustainability and resilience. The platform also aims at inspiring and supporting cities to become climate-smart and sustainable solution hotspots.
OPCC first began in 2011 in Sweden and then expanded globally in 2012, with ICLEI as the technical partner. Low carbon actions implemented by cities are reported on an internationally recognized carbon reporting platform for cities called “carbonn Climate Registry”, managed by ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability. Sustainable actions from participating cities are reviewed by an international jury of experts. After the evaluation, the best city from each country is announced as the National Winner and one city amongst the national winners is declared as the Global Winner.
Vancouver, Cape Town, Seoul, and Paris were awarded the title of Global Earth Hour Capital in 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016, respectively. In 2017-18, 132 cities representing 23 countries participated in the Challenge. Jakarta, Indonesia was adjudged as the most favourite city based on the citizen voting results of the associated We Love Cities campaign. The Swedish City of Uppsala and Rajkot from India was named global and national winner respectively of One Planet City Challenge 2018. Since the inception of the Challenge in 2011, OPCC has engaged over 400 cities across 5 continents.
Project duration:
2012 till present.
For further information, visit the project website:
http://wwf.panda.org/our_work/projects/one_planet_cities/one_planet_city_challenge/
