Green Systems Integrated to the Building Envelope: Strategies and Technical Solution for the Italian Case

Cooling the City? A Scientometric Study on Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure and Climate Change-Induced Public Health Effects

Climate change causes global effects on multiple levels. The anthropogenic input of greenhouse gases increases the atmospheric mean temperature. It furthermore leads to a higher probability of extreme weather events (e.g., heat waves, floods) and thus strongly impacts the habitats of humans, animals, and plants. Against this background, research and innovation activities are increasingly focusing on potential health-related aspects and feasible adaptation and mitigation strategies. Progressing urbanization and demographic change paired with the climate change-induced heat island effect exposes humans living in urban habitats to increasing health risks. By employing scientometric methods, this scoping study provides a systematic bird’s eye view on the epistemic landscapes of climate change, its health-related effects, and possible technological and nature-based interventions and strategies in order to make urban areas climate proof. Based on a literature corpus consisting of 2614 research articles collected in SCOPUS, we applied network-based analysis and visualization techniques to map the different scientific communities, discourses and their interrelations. From a public health perspective, the results demonstrate the range of either direct or indirect health effects of climate change. Furthermore, the results indicate that a public health-related scientific discourse is converging with an urban planning and building science driven discourse oriented towards urban blue and green infrastructure. We conclude that this development might mirror the socio-political demand to tackle emerging climate change-induced challenges by transgressing disciplinary boundaries.

Exploration for Spatial Sustainability of Microalgae Façades Based on Mock-Up Cultivation Settings

Microalgae are third-generation biomasses that can be used to extract bio-fuel with various advantages from an ecological perspective. In addition, since it is cultivated in an underwater space, it can be used as a microalgae culture space by using building facades. Architectural applications of microalgae are being carried out from various points of view in other countries such as America, Israel, and Germany. As a result, successful cases (such as Germany’s BIQ House) are emerging. However, research studies related to microalgae facade are mainly conducted in terms of culture environment and efficiency. The degree of inflow concerning external resources for a microalgae facade remains unclear. The question concerning how the environment of an indoor space where microalgae facade is installed could be changed is unclear too. Thus, the objective of this study was to analyze the impact of the space in which the microalgae facade was installed from the perspective of the lighting environment. This study also examined effects of creating a lighting environment compared to existing windows, applicable space, and supplementary points through mock-up tests on microalgae facade. As a result, it was found that the standard microalgae facade suggested by the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) could inflow 22.7–41.3% of illumination compared to general windows. If the analysis result is compared with Korean Standard A 3011 (Normal), the microalgae facade can only be applied to spaces that do not have natural light such as ‘warehouses’ and ‘stairs’. Accordingly, it is concluded that if the microalgae facade is to be used creatively, the thickness should be thinner than the standard of patent to set the standard of comfort and consider the user’s comfort in the design stage.

Evaluation of the Built-Up Area Dynamics in the First Ring of Cluj-Napoca Metropolitan Area, Romania by Semi-Automatic GIS Analysis of Landsat Satellite Images

The accentuated dynamics of the real estate markets of the last 20 years, determined that a large part of the territories in the immediate vicinity of the big urban centers, to change their category of land use, in an accelerated rhythm. Most of the time, the land use changes according to the market requirements, the predominantly agricultural lands being occupied by constructions with residential or industrial functions. Identifying these changes is a difficult task due to the heterogeneity of spatial databases that come from different real estate development projects, so determining and implementing new methods to track land changes are currently highly required. This paper presents a methodologically innovative index-based approach for the rapid mapping of built-up areas, using Landsat-5, Landsat-7, and Landsat-8 satellite imagery. The approach described in this study differs from other conventional methods by the way the analysis was performed and also by the thematic indices used in the processes of built-up area delineation. The method, structured in a complex model, based on Remote Sensing and GIS techniques, can be divided into three distinct phases. The first stage is related to the pre-processing of the remote sensing data. The second stage involves the calculation of the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), the modified normalized difference water index (MNDWI), and the bare soil index (BI) correlated with the extraction of all areas not covered by vegetation; respectively, the elimination from the result of all areas covered by water, bare land, or uncultivated arable land. The result of this stage is represented by a distinct thematic layer that contains only built-up areas and other associated territories. The last step of the model is represented by the validation of the results, which was performed based on statistical methods and also by direct comparison with field reality, obtaining a validation coefficient which is generally above 85% for any of the methods used. The validation process shows us that by applying this method, the fast mapping of the built-up areas is significantly enhanced and the model is suitable to be implemented on a larger scale in any practical and theoretical application that aims at the rapid mapping of the built-up areas and their evolutionary modeling.