Lucélia Taranto Rodrigues

The Application of Phase Change Materials to Improve the Climate Resilience of a Low-Energy Prototype House

Due to a number of reasons including the effects of climate change and a shift towards a more widespread use of Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) for housing development, overheating issues in British homes has become a greater concern in recent years. Some of the most important advantages of MMC are the reduced use of materials, reduced construction time (particularly on site), reduced weather dependency, reduction of waste production, the possibility of reuse and recycling of components, and the possible lightness of the structure. MMC systems can deliver highly insulated, almost airtight homes, in line with requirements to reduce energy use for heating. However, they will generally have lower thermal mass than traditional construction and hence be less able to passively control temperature swings in warmer periods. This may contribute to uncomfortably high temperatures, which can affect the well-being and health of the occupants.

From Grey Towards Green. About the Urban Energy Fold at Symbiont City

Instead of the energy and ecological relocation, SYMBIONT City detects energy opportunities and possible urban folding to achieve thermodynamic benefits. Although some agendas have already fostered the concept of symbiotic planning, neither current infrastructural systems nor urban regulatory frameworks allow for its real implementation. SYMBIONT is a set of local laboratories designed to enable new synergies between waste, energy and information flows on existing urban waste transfer facilities. It pretends to raise the level of urban resilience in cities by acting on existing urban facilities and adjacent urban setting through the implementation of local laboratories able to monitor, process, and reconnect existing waste, energy and information flows while recovering the notion of infrastructure as public space through social engagement actions. These spatial facilities have a strategic value as nodal urban locations—with potential phase-change capacity—for neighbourhood waste and energy flows. These micro-infrastructural interventions will help in the aforementioned transition allowing for a turn from “grey” towards “green” infrastructures, with capacity to provide social, ecological and economic benefits to urban communities such as reduction of waste disposal, local energy generation and storage, improvement of air quality, reduction of energy costs and new opportunities to social cohesion and engagement.

Building for Future Climate Resilience

A great deal of literature has been published in recent years around the need to mitigate climate change and the building industry is already working to make buildings more energy efficient. However, some changes to our climate cannot be avoided so we will need to change the way we design, construct, refurbish and use buildings to adapt to the likely increases in temperature. A great proportion of British housing is now being built using Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) systems, and this number is expected to rise significantly over the next decade. All systems are potentially able to deliver good buildings, so how to choose? Sustainability should be the order, but it is only achievable if future climate resilience is considered. Otherwise, the use of MMC to build dwellings that use less energy for heating today could result in a future undesirable scenario when energy for cooling is also needed. In this work, the occurrence of overheating today and in the future in a highly insulated 100m2 space built using eight different walls constructions has been investigated in a parametric study. The building was dynamically simulated with few parameters to allow easy comparison of the performance of each constructive system. It was found that there is a high risk of overheating in houses and this risk will not be mitigated by one solution alone. Although this not a comprehensive study by any means, it is the start of a discussion to instigate further research that could inform design decisions that address future climate resilience.