Covestro-Tongji Sustainable Development 2017 Forum occurred on December 15th at Covestro’s Production and Research Center in Pudong District of Shanghai China. Experts from a myriad of differing industries and professions, including governmental, gathered to discuss the pressing need for a new collaborative cross sectoral approach for businesses and governments to confront the problem of climate change. The second agenda of the forum also held Covestro's "Three Working Groups" camps, Sustainable PU Materials and Carbon Recycling Program, Sustainable Water Absorbent and Sponge City, Sustainable PC Materials and Smart City. At the "Three Working Groups" camp, members from the Sino-US Eco-Cities Design Laboratory organized an interactive discussion between student participants and judges experts from Covestro and UN Environment, to help inspire and generate innovative solutions in a workshop series that facilitated conversation and forward thinking between students and professionals alike.

Dr. Nanqing Jiang, began the forum by mentioning the importance that collaboration across industries and governments must play in addressing the global issue of climate change, and how it can be seen as a growing business opportunity to be involved and connected with.  Contending with climate change is an environmental issue that has a real and tangible effect upon businesses and by sharing knowledge across the supply chain (such Government, Planners, Business Leaders, Individuals, and Owners as actors) new solutions along with business opportunities can be uncovered.

Annette Wiedenbach, from Covestro, went onto to explain that although reduction of CO2 is of key importance to build a sustainable city. Further, she pointed out that "the use of materials can change the status quo and solve environmental problems." The approach based on "carbon productivity" is to use carbon emissions as a resource to harness carbon emissions and create new types of smart materials to reduce the global carbon footprint.

Yoshiki Yamagata, from Japan's National Environmental Research Institute, shared his years of research and practical experience in the field of environmental protection and analyzed the current challenges of global urbanization, carbon emissions and climate change, backgrounded with the Paris Agreement and the UN SDG Sustainable Goals. He cited Tokyo's sustainable urban design strategy to emphasize that carbon productivity plays an important role in the future environment.

The final speech of the forum was completed by Prof. Perry Yang from Georgia Institute of Technology, and members from Eco Urban Lab, who shared the ideas about the need for precision, methodology, and monitoring in construction and the role urban regeneration and supply chain management must play in dealing with climate change respectively. Through discussing the role of smart materials in three parts: urban regeneration, smart city, and sponge city. After the presentation, the Forum held three working groups dominated by the student and Covestro Materials experts engagement workshop of examining urban system design thinking of how to apply smart materials in new ways to solve old and new problems alike, to explore the urban system thus create wisdom.

Based on the sustainable development collaboration project between Covestro ,UN-Environment and IESD Tongji, the forum  was aimed for facilitating the multi-disciplinary cooperation in the context of climate change , and building up a platform for students and experts to exploit innovative and frontier ideas for a more sustainable future.