THE PROBLEM
Nature-based solutions (NbS) are being increasingly explored to assist in minimizing the impacts of the built environment, improve the quality of life in urban communities, and enhance the resilience of cities to face future challenges. Green roofs and walls have been demonstrated to influence hydrology of urban spaces, but the complete assessment of the water balance and the multiple sources of variability require novel approaches and local studies.
ABOUT
GREENER is a research project promoted by IST-ID, from Portugal, and NTNU, from Norway, and funded by the EEA Grants - European Economic Area Financial Mechanism 2014-2021.
OBJECTIVES
- Developing and testing a novel approach to assess the water balance in experimental green-roof trays.
- Provide evidences of the potential benefits of using NbS, in particular green roofs, to assist on urban water management.
STRATEGY
The project will:
- Upgrade the existing green roof trays at IST to enable the use of a novel measurement approach.
- Install a new identical green roof experimental facility at University of Aveiro.
- Define rainwater patterns in present and future climate changes scenarios in Portugal.
- Assess experimentally the full water balance in the green roof trays in forced rainfall events.
- Compare the hydrological performance of the green roofs with other locations, in particular Norway.
- Develop simple models to estimate runoff from green roofs.
