Eco-districts in Ulaanbaatar

The creation of eco-districts forms the core of the large-scale initiative called the "Ulaanbaatar Green Affordable Housing and Resilient Urban Renewal Sector Project" that aims to provide sustainable and comprehensive solutions to transform the highly vulnerable, highly emitting, and polluting "ger" areas (gers are traditional Mongolian tents) into affordable, low carbon, climate-resilient, and livable areas. Ulanbaataar experiences incremental growth and migration, leading to informal districts, and thus hotspots of greenhouse emissions and air pollution, mainly due to the widespread use of coal for heating and cooking. The project's five phases will deliver about 20 eco-districts or sub-projects with thousands of social housing units along with key infrastructure such as roads, water, sewerage, heating pipes and green houses for urban farming as well as public and green spaces, among many other solutions.

Overview

Type of instrument:

Legislative, regulatory and strategic instruments›Urban planning mechanisms

Challenges addressed

Soil quality
Water management (e.g. reuse)
Green space management (e.g. accessibility)
Flood risk: pluvial and fluvial / soil permeability
Landslide risk
Air quality
Social cohesion
Human health, comfort and well-being

Consideration of nature-based solutions:

The project seeks to create new urban green (such as parks, urban forests or neighbourhood green spaces) and green areas for sustainable water management e.g. for drainage and sewage as well as smaller green elements (such as allies, street green, new gardens and playgrounds), but primarily also to

Targeted (peri-)urban areas:

Parks and (semi)natural urban green areas

Allotments, community gardens or agricultural areas

Blue areas

Green areas for water management

Derelict areas

Urban green space connected to grey infrastructure

Good practice characteristics:

Support multifunctional NBS

Sustainable in the long-term

Innovative

Inclusivity

Governance

Government body/bodies

Initiating body:

Municipality of Ulaanbaatar

Instrument design:

Details about how the instrument was designed:

There is no information available on this topic

Instrument implementation:

Type of involvement:

One central element of the project is the "voluntary land swapping" approach for implementing the eco-districts. This includes the option for households owning or renting a plot of land within the proposed eco-district perimeter to choose whether they like to participate or not. If they opt to participate, households will have access to a housing unit in the eco-district (e.g. through land and asset swaps, rent-to-own schemes, or affordable rental arrangements). If they do not want to participate, the eco-district design will be adjusted to avoid affecting the non-participating household. In addition, a community participation plan including skills training and linkages with job opportunities will be implemented for affected households.

Targeted actors:

Public sector institution (e.g. school or hospital)

Private: household, real estate developer, business , financial

Financing

Sources of funding:

Public national budget

Loans from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and grants from Green Climate Fund (GCF) and other

Budget:

Above 10 000 000€

Details about instrument financing:

The total project value is $570,1 million, over an estimated time period of 40 years. Financial support of the project includes loans by the Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) ($80 million plus another $95 million), a $50 million grant from the Green Climate Fund (GCF), as well as a $3 million sector grant from the High-Level Technology Fund (HLTF), established in 2017 to provide financing for innovative solutions in ADB projects.

Monitoring, evaluation and impacts

Is a monitoring framework in place?:

Yes

No detailed information found.

Did an evaluation take place?:

Yes

No detailed information found.

Achieved outcomes and impacts:

This large project is expected to improve the living conditions around 100,000 people, including 10,000 direct beneficiary households that will have access to green housing units. The project will also lead to improve sanitation, the quality of air, soil and water as well as water supply and the environmental condition of the areas. It will further lead to a increased capacity to address climate hazards/natural disasters. Overall, the project is expected to avoid at least 431.500 Tonnes of CO2 emissions.

Success factors and lessons learned:

The large-scale project is still ongoing. Therefore, no success factors or lessons learned have been published so far. Nontheless, if the project is implemented as planned, many people will be positively affected by improved living standards.

Sources and further information

References

List of references:

Macrotrends (2022). Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia Metro Area Population 1950-2022. Available at: https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/21882/ulaanbaatar/population (Accessed: 25 October 2022).

Green Climate Fund (n.d.) PROJECTS & PROGRAMMES: FP077: Ulaanbaatar Green Affordable Housing and Resilient Urban Renewal Project (AHURP). Available at: https://www.greenclimate.fund/project/fp077 (Accessed on 25 October 2022).

ADB (2018). FP077: ADB to Help Ulaanbaatar Transform its Ger Areas into Eco-Districts. Available at: https://www.adb.org/news/adb-help-ulaanbaatar-transform-its-ger-areas-eco-districts (Accessed on 25 October 2022).

Urban Nature Atlas (2021): Eco-district in Ulaanbaatar Available at: https://una.city/nbs/ulaanbaatar/eco-district-ulaanbaatar (Accessed on 25 October 2022).

Photos

@E. Bayansan auf Pixabay