• Regional Planning Theory
  • Law of Conservation and Development
  • Urban Transition in the Global South
  • Space Application for Sustainable development
  • Sustainable Urban Systems
  • Community Development
  • Energy, Poverty and Development
  • Energy and Climate Change
  • Introduction to Energy Policy and Sustainable Energy

APG5023F REGIONAL PLANNING THEORY

Convener: T Katzschner and Professor V Watson (HEQSF level 9, 20 NQF credits)
Course entry requirements: None
Co-requisites: APG5020F
Course outline: This advanced course aims to develop an understanding of the natural landscape framework of regional planning. Topics include: conceptual exploration of landscape processes and patterns; methods of regional landscape analysis and synthesis; and landscape management frameworks. The course then explores the regional economic development framework. Topics include: models of regional economic development; issues and debates; and SA national and regional economic development policies. The course concludes with the settlement and services framework of regional planning: processes of settlement formation. Topics include: resultant settlement patterns (size and spatial); major issues and debates relating to service provision.

APG5073F LAW OF CONSERVATION AND DEVELOPMENT

Convener: A/Prof S Townsend (HESQF level 9, 12 NQF credits)
Course Entry Requirements: Consult specific Degree Rules in the General Information section of the Postgraduate Engineering and the Built Environment Handbook.
Course Outline: This course aims to develop an understanding of the law of conservation and development. Topics include: introduction to South African law; administrative law; heritage resources law; and current legislative framework for planning and development control.

CIV5064Z URBAN TRANSITIONS IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH

Convener: Professor E Pieterse (HEQSF level 9, 20 NQF credits)
Course entry requirements: Any suitable four-year degree
Course outline: The aim of this course is to provide students with a wide-ranging introduction to the dynamics of differential urbanization processes in the global South with an eye on understanding the role of infrastructure in advancing more sustainable urban forms and patterns. The overarching learning objectives of the module are to understand the nature, drivers and consequences of the second urban transition from a sustainability perspective, as well as to make connections between urbanisation and long-term sustainability outcomes in different contexts, settings and scales. Topics covered include problems and issues of developing cities, poverty, exclusion, informality, livelihoods, economic development, governance and infrastructure.

EEE5125Z SPACE APPLICATIONS FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Convener: Professor P Martinez (HEQSF level 9, 15 NQF credits; block release)
Course outline:  Space systems play a critical role in the modern information society. The course will focus on the applications of space technology to address sustainable development challenges from a local and global perspective. The three main pillars of space applications are: Earth observation, communications and satellite-aided positioning, timing and navigation. These technologies may be applied to a wide variety of problems in food, water and human security, climate change, environmental management, disaster management and telemedicine and tele-education. The course will provide an overview of the main applications of space systems to support sustainable development. The course content will be supplemented by hands-on workshops in which students will have the opportunity to work with satellite data to solve real-world problems.

END5042Z SUSTAINABLE URBAN SYSTEMS

Convener: Associate Professor H Von Blottnitz (HEQSF level 9, 20 NQF credits)
Course entry requirements: Ordinarily a four-year degree; - registered honours students may be accepted subject to approval by the Course Convenor.
Course outline: The quest for sustainable development has a significant urban component. A fundamental condition for achieving this is restructuring the processes of production consumption and waste generation within urban/industrial complexes. This transdisciplinary course aims to explore the need for, and ways of, undertaking 'restructuring', including the following: the imperative of sustainable development; general systems theory with respect to the interactions between industrial/urban systems and ecological systems; physical constraints based on energy and mass balances and thermodynamics; the concept of urban metabolism; case studies of industrial and urban systems restructuring in practice; and insight from the literature on disciplinary specialisation and interaction as it relates to sustainable development.

END5043Z COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT

Convener: Dr M Brown-Luthango (HEQSF level 9, 20 NQF credits)
Course entry requirements: None
Course outline: This course aims to explore the involvement of community groups in the provision of infrastructure in the context of a withdrawal of the State from infrastructure development in many cities of the South. The main thrust of this module is to track how current international community development themes shape practice to provide a context for community development as an ideal. Various themes, including governance and livelihoods, the relationship between infrastructure and development, community-driven processes in the context of the “Right to the City” and data-collection techniques, including participatory tools for getting and analysing information are dealt with at length in this module