The UAE's 'Zero Carbon' City is a Huge Failure. Here's Why.

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[curlyspikes]

I worked in Abu Dhabi 12 years ago and visited Masdar several times on business. We couldn't work out where the $22bn had been spent. It was a typical grandiose UAE project of that period where international "consultancies" ripped them off and delivered very little. Oh! and the electric taxi pods were always out of order.

[weatherlou]

shocking…😂 but hey at least 15K inhabitants…better than anything Saudi has done

[conqc]

First question should be, why would anyone want to live there? If they cant answer that question then it was a waste of money building it.

[MrKatsushita]

Years ago at a Sustainability conference, I asked a Masdar rep where sustainable agriculture fit into the project. He was confused by my question and said, “We’re just a developer.” Yeah, just a developer.

[Mr.G.Rection]

Has anyone commented that the whole thing was "Greenwashing" from its very inception. Just a way to divert international criticism of the UAE's obvious carbon excess...?

[olencone]

Going from "zero carbon" to "low carbon" is basically going from "city of the future" to "just another city."

[Grace-erep]

Its sad that to see all these different futuristic cities fail. I think that on the surface the idea of a fully green city is an ambitious and admirable goal but the scale of these projects cause them to run out of money too fast and stifling their progress with large tech expenses. I think a carbon-negative neighborhood is totally achievable with the right location and climate appropriate architecture but I don't see any of these planned cities focusing on that. If we could start out smaller with neighborhoods and financial and industrial districts going as green as possible then I think we'd (humanity as a group) be better prepared for creating working and sustainable green cities

[gcwyatt]

As much as I love these videos about failed mega project planed cities, I'd actually love to see a video about planned cities that are a success. Maybe even conclude what these projects had in common that made them a success compared to these other projects that are failures.

[carlosmartin]

the great thing about such failiures is that you can make a very long list of what went wrong and make it better next time or create a task list of changes to move towards the original vision, in a Zen fashion that is. Certain critical technologies have improved or changed direction in the recent years and may show a better path towards the Green City of the future

[Damons-Old-Soul]

There are two philosophies to creating product for people. The first is to create an ideal that exists in the creator's mind, advertise how amazing it is and refuse to offer any options outside that initial ideal. The second focuses more on making sure the creation is useable for it's intended (as advertised) purpose. Offering options to make it more personal is there from the beginning and grow as production is able to ramp up. Most cities planned and built before people move in, are the first. They go with: *You will like this and will never complain!* as their way of handling all of it. These are "Form over Function", where looks matter and only looks matter.

[ekaterinastacey]

I lived in Abu Dhabi between 2010-2014 (after which I moved to Dubai); we used to go to a sushi restaurant in Masdar "city". The self driving pods were pretty cool for the time and navigated a set route using magnets, which was basically useless in the real world where tram/rail transportation already existed for decades. Nevertheless, they were a bit of fun, but wouldn't be in any way impressive by today's self-driving cars standards. The architecture was pretty cool and, in places, dystopian and otherworldly, but that was the most I can say about that. The Institute of Science and Tech was the only notable organisation at Masdar that kept the whole place from being, pardon the pun, deserted.

[garyclark]

As Adam Savage says, "Failure is always an option". The key is to learn from the mistakes, and do better next time.

[ForgeMasterXXL]

This project is remarkable that any of it worked, so praise the successes, learn from the mistakes and build the next one better and closer to not just net zero but a city that reduces atmospheric carbon.

[nathanielrohwer]

Simon, I have a suggestion for a video, although I am not sure if it would be a Megaproject or a Sideproject. A video covering the General Motors Sunraycer from the eighties would be interesting. In addition coverage of the World Solar Challenge would be welcome too. I was a kid in the eighties and the Sunraycer was a big deal back then.

[UncommonSense]

How much carbon was “used” to build what they have?

[Bokeh-Okeh-Studios]

How does one man make so much content. He must have a clone 10 channels lol

[michaelwerner]

I lived in the UAE for 5 years. Masdar was a gimmick when it was announced, and will always be.

[kidShibuya]

0:53 lol scared the carp out of me, thought it was thunder! Guess my sub is doing a good job...

[gtc]

Omg thank you for making this. News about this City just kinda disappeared. I was so fascinated by it when it was first started…as were a tonne of YouTubers

[EufemiaOki]

urbanplanadvisor AI fixes this. UAE's "Zero Carbon" City failure