The majority of Australia’s population lives in urban areas. Consequently, where humans reside, there tends to be greater concentrations of pollution that leads to issues with air and water quality. While this may seem bleak, the upside with cities is that they have the brain power and human and capital resources to make sweeping changes and put us on a more sustainable track. Melbourne recently won a City Climate Leadership Award, largely for the huge investments the city and its residents are making to reduce energy consumption in commercial buildings, the city’s largest energy user. Sustainable policies are driving it all – the City of Melbourne established a net zero emissions target that has led the City administration to allocated ample resources to improve buildings’ energy performance throughout the city. Guided by the 1200 Buildings Plan, Melbourne plans to achieve these aggressive targets by offering existing building owners generous incentives to make efficiency retrofits to their buildings. Simultaneously, the city is increasing efficiency requirements for all new construction. And already, things have taken off with a quick start – just two years in and 10% of potential buildings have undergone energy retrofits with another 5% committed to take action. The C40 and Siemens City Climate Leadership Awards use an independent, seven-member judging panel — consisting of former city Mayors, architects and representatives of the World Bank, C40 and Siemens judged 120 cities and agreed on the ten winning city projects in the following categories:Bogota (Urban Transportation)Copenhagen (Carbon Measurement & Planning)Melbourne (Energy Efficient Built Environment)Mexico City (Air Quality)Munich (Green Energy)New York City (Adaptation & Resilience)Rio de Janeiro (Sustainable Communities)San Francisco (Waste Management)Singapore (Intelligent City Infrastructure)Tokyo (Finance & Economic Development)Image: Production Perig/Shutterstock