The Impact of Urban Morphology on Carbon Emissions Under Urban Renewal: A Critical Review

The greenhouse effect poses a severe environmental challenge to global sustainable development. Carbon emissions, as a major source of greenhouse gases, make their reduction a crucial goal of urban renewal. This paper provides a systematic literature review of over 100 empirical studies published in the Web of Science over the past decade. The results show that the impact of urban form on carbon emissions exhibits spatial heterogeneity and nonlinearity, while urban compactness reduces emissions in small and medium-sized cities but may increase emissions in some large mega cities. Meanwhile, three-dimensional morphological indicators (e.g., building height, sky view factor) exhibit a U-shaped effect on operational carbon emissions, and are primarily mediated by local microclimate effects. In addition, this study also summarized the differences in carbon emissions throughout the entire life cycle of urban renewal and across different climate zones. Only a few studies adopt a full life-cycle assessment, and most of them focused on operational rather than embodied carbon. This review credits itself as the first one of its kind to examine the relationship between urban form, urban function, and carbon emissions from the perspective of urban renewal, providing both theoretical reference and practical insights for low-carbon strategies.