Darryl J. Newport

Initial insights on the biodiversity potential of biosolar roofs: a London Olympic Park green roof case study

Cities dominated by impervious artificial surfaces can experience a multitude of negative environmental impacts. Restoration of green infrastructure has been identified as a mechanism for increasing urban resilience, enabling cities to transition towards sustainable futures in the face of climate-driven change. Building rooftops represent a viable space for integrating new green infrastructure into high-density urban areas. Urban rooftops also provide prime locations for photovoltaic (PV) systems. There is an increasing recognition that these two technologies can be combined to deliver reciprocal benefits in terms of energy efficiency and biodiversity targets. Scarcity of scientific evaluation of the interaction between PVs and green roofs means that the potential benefits are currently poorly understood. This study documents evidence from a biodiversity monitoring study of a substantial biosolar roof installed in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Vegetation and invertebrate communities were sampled and h...

Are microbial communities in green roof substrates comparable to those in post-industrial sites?—a preliminary study

Green roofs have been implemented on new buildings as a tool to mitigate the loss of post-industrial or brownfield land. For this to be successful, the roofs must be designed appropriately; that is with the right growing media, suitable substrate depth, similar vegetation and with a comparable soil microbial community for a healthy rhizosphere. This study compared soil microbial communities (determined using phospholipid fatty acid or PLFA analysis) of two extensive green roofs and two post-industrial sites in Greater London. It was found that green roof rootzones constructed using engineered growing media are not depauperate, but can have an abundant soil microbial community that in some cases may be more diverse and numerous than communities found in brownfield areas. In this preliminary study, one green roof supported abundant soil microbial communities that were dominated by gram negative and aerobic bacteria, whilst fungal abundance was similar across all sites analysed. Furthermore, ratios of fungal: bacterial PLFA’s were larger from post-industrial sites but overall were consistent with bacterial dominated soils typical of early successional habitats.

Development of a Building Information Modelling (BIM)-Based Real-Time Data Integration System Using a Building Management System (BMS)

Building Information Modelling (BIM) has become a very important part of the construction industry, and it has not yet reached its full potential, but the use of BIM is not just limited to the construction industry. The aim of BIM is to provide a complete solution for the life cycle of the built environment from the design stage to construction and then to operation. One of the biggest challenges faced by the facility managers is to manage the operation of the infrastructure sustainably; however, this can be achieved through the installation of a Building Management System (BMS). Currently, the use of BIM in facilities management is limited because it does not offer real-time building data integration, which is vital for infrastructure operation. This chapter investigates the integration of real-time data from the BMS system into a BIM model, which would aid facility managers to interact with the real-world environment inside the BIM model. We present the use of web socket functionality to transmit and receive data in real-time over the Internet in a 3D game environment to provide a user-friendly system for the facility managers to help them operate their infrastructure more effectively. This novel and interactive approach would provide rich information about the built environment, which would not have been possible without the integration of BMS with BIM.