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The Circular City: Towards a Sustainable Urban Ecosystem

Learn how to connect urban material, water, and energy flows to build a truly sustainable city. Due to their environmental impact, cities play a crucial role in the transition towards sustainable societies. Despite the fact that they occupy only 3% of the global terrestrial surface, cities house more than half of the world’s population, consume 70% of its natural resources, and are directly and indirectly responsible for 60 to 80% of global greenhouse gas emissions (UNEP, 2012). The urban environment thus acts as a nexus of material flows and nodes for energy, water, consumption and production. Cities are key leverage points that demand our focus if we are to accelerate the necessary transition to circular and sustainable systems, both locally and globally.

There are still some spots left on this programme. We will close the application link once the programme is full, or by latest March 31st.

  • Programme at a glance
    Mode of instruction: On-campus (3 weeks) 
    Academic dates: Sunday 21 July - Thursday 8 August 2024
    Housing dates:  Friday 19 July - Friday 9 August 2024
    Academic fees:

    Student fee: 

    €1750. Read more about what is included in the fees.

    Professional fee:

    €2000. Read more about what is included in the fees.

    Housing fees:  €850 for a private room and shared facilities. Housing is optional. Read more about university-organised accomodation
    Credits: 6 European Credits. Read more about credits and credit transfer.  
    Early admissions deadline:

    Thursday 1 February 2024. 

    Students who require a Schengen Visa to study in the Netherlands are strongly advised to apply before the early deadline to ensure there is enough time to secure a visa appointment before the programme begins.

    Regular admissions deadline: Sunday 31 March 2024 
    Who is this programme for?                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

    Level: Advanced Bachelor, Masters and working professionals.

    Background: Students should have a strong background in social sciences, with a particular focus in in urban studies, earth sciences, sustainability and other related fields. Working professionals with experience in the above fields who wish to continue their education are also welcome to apply.

  • Programme description

    In this three-week summer programme, students are taught how to leverage the potential of cities via a new paradigm for urban planning and design: urban metabolism. While this concept has been around for over 50 years, recent interest in it has rejuvenated the fields of urban studies, industrial ecology, and architecture. Urban metabolism can be defined as the sum total of the technical and socio-economic processes that occur in cities, resulting in growth, and production of energy, materials, and waste. The city is viewed by its ‘material flows’, generally defined into water, energy, materials (including food), and waste. These flows consist of inputs (local, regional, and global inflow of resources), throughputs (energy required to transform these resources and waste produced by any process), and outputs (the material outcome of this process).  

    This interdisciplinary course unravels the complexity behind  truly sustainable urban development. Through studying examples from Amsterdam and by sharing best practices and key challenges from their home contexts, participants will learn about several aspects of urban resilience from ecological, economic, and cultural perspectives.  

    Through the use of different tools, scientific methods and analysis, students will experience experimental urban design both theoretically, and gain an introduction to innovative tools and methods, able to apply their knowledge learned in a wide variety of settings. 

  • Explore our community

    Want to get to know more about studying in Amsterdam? Follow us on social media and join our summer community. Get a feel for our summer school vibe and our academic and social community, and learn about studying with us through the eyes of past summer school students. 

    Instagram | Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter

    Looking for an alumni perspective? Read this interview with Piotr Barzack, who attended The Circular City in summer 2018. 

  • Academic Directors

    Dr. Daphne Truijens is an evidence-based policy and innovation specialist, currently working as a sustainability consultant at TheRockGroup. TheRockGroup is a boutique sustainability consultancy with offices in Amsterdam, Brussels and Cape Town. Daphne has over 10 years of experience working with academia, business and government on finding research-driven solutions for wicked societal issues. Her focus areas are sustainability  and healthcare and wellbeing. She holds a PhD in Philosophy and (behavioral) Economics from Erasmus University Rotterdam, and an MA in philosophy of science and LLM in legal theory from Leiden University. In addition, Daphne is the founder of the THRIVE PhD Academy helping researchers make more impact, and has held several advisory board member positions including Open Research Europe from the European Commission.

     

    Cas Smitmans (MA) has extensive experience working as a sustainability professional in various roles such as advisor at TheRockGroup and as a teacher. Cas has helped set up various professional educational programs, such as summer schools & traineeships. Cas holds a BA in Business administration from Radboud University & a MA in Global Business & Sustainability from Erasmus University Rotterdam. In different roles Cas has helped organisations, and especially people within those organisations, with tools to steer towards sustainable practices. 

Facts & Figures
Mode
Short-term
Credits
6 ECTS, 3 weeks
Language of instruction
English
Conditions for admission
Open
Starts in
July