Manuel Correia Guedes

The Increasing Demand on High-Rise Buildings and Their History

Large-scale urban centres have entered the twenty-first century with a paradox to discuss. As the cities touch the skies with their growing skyscrapers, they also reach out to attract and embrace as many people as possible. Aiming to become an important financial, commercial, cultural, technological, or touristic place, and therefore attract investments, they need to grow. The more the cities grow, more people are needed to make it grow. With more people, more infrastructures are necessary. In this on-going trend, tall buildings appear both as protagonists and antagonists.

Sustainable Architecture in Africa

This chapter results from research developed during the EU SURE-Africa Co-opener project. The project aimed at strengthening knowledge and its application in practice, contributing to a sustainable development through the vital area of energy efficiency in buildings and cities, and, ultimately, to reduce poverty. Academic and professional expertise from three EU Universities – namely the Higher Technical Institute (IST, Coordinator, Portugal), the University of Cambridge (UK) and the University of Lund (Sweden) – was used to set up a data-base of information, in cooperation with Academic Institutions in Portuguese-speaking African countries (Angola, Mozambique, Cape Verde, Guinea Bissau and S. Tome), containing information about tools, case studies and teaching material in the field of sustainable, energy-efficient building and urban design. Seminars, workshops and conferences took place, and best-practice manuals were published as a final outcome of the project.