EGU24 submission on Green Panel performance

My abstract titled 'Green Panel performance testing - Analysis from one season of monitoring data and implications for urban scale applications' has been accepted for the session HS5.3.4 – Green Infrastructure for Sustainable Urban Hazard Management at the European Geosciences Union 2024 General Assembly, to be presented in April. 

Here is the abstract:

Most cities have climate goals such as lowering the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect and reducing flood damages. Green infrastructure (GI) can help mitigate the UHI effects and has the potential to locally delay flood peaks. However, in dense urban infrastructure there is often little space for ground based vegetation. Green roofs are therefore a feasible implementation option even within city centres. While there is a myriad of types of green roofs available for flat roofs, and their performance is tested in various environments, sloped roofs as of yet have few design options available. To this end, Green Panels were developed as a novel type of GI for sloped roofs. As it is a novel design, its performance can be estimated only by literature results of GI applying different designs and materials. To overcome this research gap, in this case study a Green Panel prototype was constructed and its performance was monitored over a period of 3-4 months at the University of Twente, the Netherlands.

The experimental setup consisted of 1 m2 of Green Panels, and 1 m2 of regular roof tiles as control area, both at a slope of 45 degrees. The materials of the Green Panels, mounted on the same railing as solar panels, is High Density Polyethylene, while different substrates were tested: soil, rock wool, recycled fabric, and combinations thereof. Applied sensors were a soil moisture and temperature sensor (Truebner SMT50) and an environmental sensor (BME680), including a thermal sensor, both connected to Sensebox Mini dataloggers. The soil moisture sensors were placed in each of 6 Green Panel trays. The environmental sensors were placed above and below the roof tiles in both control and Green Panel locations, as well as above and below the Green Panels themselves. The measured parameters were air temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, VOC, soil temperature, and soil moisture. These values were compared to meteorological data from a local weather station at 5km distance. Other benefits such as increased biodiversity were not monitored, though species such as ladybug (family Coccinellidae) and fly (family Muscidae) were observed.

Analysis of the results shows that there is a small effect of Green Panels on reducing extreme temperatures, and errors in measurement setup and gaps in data continuity did not affect validity. The implications of this analysis were extrapolated to the urban scale for the city of Enschede to help answer what an appropriate performance monitoring scheme is for cities intending to implement GI and still uncertain about when their climate goals are being met.

Warm Sweater Day

Today it is Warm Sweater Day in the Netherlands, where we are all encouraged to wear more clothes and turn the heating down. I have a lot of thoughts about this, as we try to live as sustainably and circular as possible, this does make a noticable difference, also for our energy expenses. I already practice this daily and wear at least five layers in winter, so there is not more I can do to improve this.

In the end, if we use less heating, this reduces our resource consumption and it has a positive effect on the environment overall. This has an offset of course by having to wash more clothes, which also costs energy, water, and detergent. If you check your energy use you can easily see that heating a space on average will outweigh the costs of additional washing by a factor of 4-10, at least for the direct energy consumption. From a life cycle perspective, it does not include the energy needed to treat and pump the water to the washing machine, or to produce and transport the detergent. I still estimate those costs totalled would be less than increased heating.

An additional consideration is, in winter, how low can you go, and in summer vice versa if you were to wear less and not use cooling, how high can you go, while still being healthy? For several groups of potentially vulnerable people, such as older adults, children, pregnant people, and people with certain medical conditions, the temperatures cannot be too low or high, or medical conditions arise. These groups of people have a smaller acceptable temperature margin than the average population. This means that even if we use more sweaters, there is a limit. What is it?

This website selling airconditioning mentions research from the Technical University in Helsinki and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. It says for work the ideal temperature is 21-22 degrees Celsius; bathrooms 22-24, adult bedrooms 16-19 and child bedrooms 17-20. Indoor temperatures less than 16 degrees can lead to molds and asthma. Less than 12 degrees can impact the cardiovasculair system. Cold indoor temperatures can increase depression, confusion, decrease concentration, and increase chronic pain. Heat can lead to headaches, fatigue, and less concentration. The online manual VHG Het Levende Gebouw (The living building) also states that every degree over 25 and under 20 leads to a drop of 2% in productivity. This seems to be an ideal range for the average population.

We could keep our indoor temperatures around 18 degrees if we manage to dress more warmly. But this still has to be balanced with activity, to even out how warm you feel inside. We know it is healthier to not sit down for hours on end without moving, and the positive benefits of a walk, especially in nature, are proven as well. So yes, wear more sweaters to save on heating, but also move your body regularly, about every hour, and get a cup of hot water/hot drink.

Examples of Green Infrastructure: tiny forest

A tiny forest is a dense forest with native trees and about the size of a tennis court. This forest is not only a pleasant place for butterflies, birds, bees and small mammals, but also for people. Children learn about Dutch nature in the outdoor classroom and local residents meet each other in a pleasant and healthy place. A tiny forest also provides cooling on hot days, more biodiversity and water storage during heavy rainfall. This video shows an example tiny forest at an elementary school in Enschede.

 

 

Article on cyclone disaster published

The International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction has published an article I co-authored with my colleague Nasif Ashan: Title: ‘We knew a cyclone was imminent’: Hazard preparedness and disaster management efficiency nexus in coastal Bangladesh. Reference: IJDRR_104240

You can access it for free until March 9 2024 here:https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1iSUI7t2zZHCSP

The abstract reads as follows: 

"Natural hazard-prone countries in the global south adopted an anticipatory-preparedness approach in disaster risk reduction (DRR) by shifting away from the response and rehabilitation approach. It was highly associated with the policy recommendations of the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) framework. Nevertheless, challenges remained in managing disaster risks due to heterogeneous efficiency among disaster managers. This research examines the institutional effectiveness of the disaster management agency in cyclone-prone areas in southwestern coastal Bangladesh through network analysis. This research also explores institutional efficiency’s impact on household preparedness in mitigating losses. We collected two distinct data sets from the local Union Disaster Management Committee (UDMC) and households in the same operational area of UDMC that were at risk of cyclonic disasters. To evaluate the effectiveness of local disaster management institutions, we conducted structured interviews with 336 representatives, spanning eight UDMCs in the cyclone-prone regions. To assess the impact of institutional performance (specifically, the UDMCs) on household disaster preparedness and loss mitigation, we collected data from 696 at-risk households. These households were located within the operational zones of the eight UDMCs, and the data was obtained using a structured questionnaire. Based on the application of social network analysis, our findings demonstrated that UDMC members were more active in the aftermath of disasters, as confirmed by three centrality measures - degree, eigenvector, and betweenness. Consequently, upon employing the Negative Binomial and Poisson regression models, we found a positive association between household engagement with UDMCs and participation in disaster preparedness training. This training appeared to enhance the knowledge and capacity of the respondents. The spill-over effects from disaster preparedness appeared to bolster the resilience of at-risk households, assist them in avoiding disaster-induced damages, and maintain consumption stability in the wake of disasters."

Green Panel sensor data analysis - initial plans

Four groups of third year students from the bachelor minor module 'smart solutions for sustainable cities' have presented their plans to analyze the available three month data for the Green Panels. Their findings will be the basis for in depth analysis and a paper presented at the upcoming EGU24. Some groups already showed an initial comparison with data from the local meteorological station, with temperature peaks during hours of high solar radiation. This suggests the surrounding flat, black roof might have a greater influence on the temperature than initially anticipated. We still await to see whether or not there is any significant difference in water retention for the different applied substrates.