Background and Goal
With the Green Deal, the European Union highlights the urgency of climate change mitigation and adaptation. The building sector is responsible for 38% of CO2 emissions worldwide and offers high potential for improvement. However, previous approaches to neighborhood development often take a one-sided view, as a holistic assessment of the complex urban system seems hardly feasible. Therefore, it is important to identify frameworks that combine climate change mitigation and adaptation while contributing positively to the regeneration of our planet's biocapacity. This dissertation shows how interactions between buildings and outdoor space can be investigated and what relevance they have for decision-making in neighborhood development with regard to resulting synergies and trade-offs. Additionally, this work explores how to make this knowledge accessible to professionals.
Methodology
First, existing usages of the terms synergy and trade-off in various disciplines are analyzed. These interpretations are then transfered to the building sector and allow to derive corresponding evaluation indicators and establish a generic process for optimized multi-objective decision support in neighborhood development, called here the Urban Systems Exploration. Parametric building and neighborhood models allow to investigate the synergetic effect of measure combinations as well as multi-objective trade-offs with regard to lifecycle-based greenhouse gas emissions, lifecycle costs, and outdoor thermal comfort. Based on the results, neighborhood fact sheets are developed. These allow for the integration of the findings into planning and decision-making processes. Finally, expert interviews are conducted to ensure the usability of these fact sheets and to improve their visualization.
Results and Conclusion
The proposed Urban Systems Exploration process and the evaluation of synergistic effects within the built environment establish a foundation for integrating interactions between buildings and outdoor spaces into decision-making processes. Several case study applications show that exploring the Pareto-optimal scope for action significantly contributes to balanced neighborhood planning. This supports planners and decision-makers in identifying well-founded framework conditions for urban neighborhoods. However, Urban Systems Exploration requires an interdisciplinary approach and pronounced systems thinking of all stakeholders. The neighborhood fact sheets offer a low-threshold basis for discussing prevailing interactions in the early planning phases. The case studies demonstrate that outdoor greening, in combination with high building energy standards and photovoltaic surfaces, contributes to the parallel improvement of lifecycle-based greenhouse gas emissions, lifecycle costs, and outdoor thermal comfort. In addition, these planning variables are well suited to specifically control Pareto-optimal trade-offs and thus adapt designs to the respective neighborhood context.
In summary, the need for a systemic view of urban space for the sustainable transformation of the building sector is evident. Therefore, it is recommended to adopt a multi-objective approach in planning processes and to base decisions on a complete exploration of the scope for action.
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Background and Goal
With the Green Deal, the European Union highlights the urgency of climate change mitigation and adaptation. The building sector is responsible for 38% of CO2 emissions worldwide and offers high potential for improvement. However, previous approaches to neighborhood development often take a one-sided view, as a holistic assessment of the complex urban system seems hardly feasible. Therefore, it is important to identify frameworks that combine climate change mitigation and ada...
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