Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter 6
A Green Building Envelope: A Crucial
Contribution to Biophilic Cities
Marc Ottelé
Abstract Throughout history, greening of outside walls and roofs of buildings has
taken place. Reasons for doing so were the increase of insulation (keep cool in
summer and keep cold out in winter), improved esthetics, improved indoor and
outdoor climate, adsorption of particulate matter (PM
x
), as well as increasing
ecological values by creating habitats for birds and insects. Green façades and
living walls systems can improve the (local) environment in cities. They offer
more surfaces with vegetation and, at the same time, contribute to the improve-
ment of the thermal performance of buildings. Although in the past, relatively little
attention has been paid to these valuable opportunities of vegetation and its
interaction with buildings. More and more attention is shifted to these so-called
beneficial relations in especially dense urban areas, which can be considered as
deserts in biological terms. This movement from a biophilic perspective point of
view includes combining nature and natural elements in the built environment to
ameliorate the negative impact of climate change as for example loss of biodi-
versity, mitigation of urban heat, or air pollution reduction.
6.1 Introduction
Cities and urban environments contain a variety of ecological and green assets,
efforts are being made to further enhance the green elements and features of these
living and work environments at the building scale. Integrating the positive aspects
of greenery inside urban environments is called: Biophilic urbanism (Beatley and
Newman
2013
). A biophilic designed city is more than a biodiverse city; it is a
place that learns from nature and emulates natural systems, incorporates natural
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