Design Strategies and LCA of Alternative Solutions …
207
2 The Environmental Approach
As environmental expert, the research group from the ABC Department had the role
of supporting the design process identifying and selecting approaches, tools and
solutions able to guarantee the highest environmental performances in the intervention throughout its entire life cycle. Thus, it was a significant opportunity to transfer
theoretical models of analysis and evaluation into a real situation carrying out the
activity in a continuous confrontation and collaboration with the typical stakeholders
that characterize design, construction and management activities in the real estate
area.
The aim was to go beyond the state-of-the-art about carbon footprint issue in buildings, adopting, experimenting, and testing innovative solutions. As a starting point,
of course, the selected environmental approach took into account elements/indicators
that are typically considered in the various environmental certifications with voluntary adhesion present in the Italian market (e.g., ITACA protocol, LEED certification,
CasaClima, and Well) paying attention to elements such as user well-being, water
and other natural resources management, energy and pollutant consumption, materials, site features, and integration in the context, relations, and mobility systems.
All of these issues were addressed in order to reach levels of excellence with respect
to the possibilities provided by technologies and indeed by introducing solutions
of strong process and product innovation. In addition to this, in the environmental
assessment model proposed, the users and their behavior during the use phase were
also introduced as fundamental elements both to measure the real impacts of the
intervention and to allow, through continuous monitoring and rewarding solutions,
the progressive improvement of the “building-human being” system with respect
to the issues of environmental sustainability, the use of resources, the response to
climate change, quality of life, and the construction of a “resilient community.”
Therefore, the final choice was to launch an ambitious challenge in which the
environmental values of building interventions, deriving from human being-building
interaction, would have been really monitored and verified also during the use phase
to support the introduced tools for the correction and continuous improvement of
environmental performance. This was done because the measurements made once
the buildings are in use normally show a substantial difference between design forecasts in terms of consumption/impact up to 200% (Lehmann et al. 2017). Moreover,
the human factor or “human behavior” is normally not considered or assessed in
environmental protocols, even if human behavior in energy consumption alone can
produce variations with respect to design forecasts of between 10 and 80% (van
Dronkelaar et al. 2016).
For this reason, in order to reduce to the minimum the environmental impacts—
with the ultimate goal of eliminating any impact over a time span of 50 years, which
was the duration defined for the project during the structuring phase of the initiative—
a number of specific solutions were introduced in the final project.
207
2 The Environmental Approach
As environmental expert, the research group from the ABC Department had the role
of supporting the design process identifying and selecting approaches, tools and
solutions able to guarantee the highest environmental performances in the intervention throughout its entire life cycle. Thus, it was a significant opportunity to transfer
theoretical models of analysis and evaluation into a real situation carrying out the
activity in a continuous confrontation and collaboration with the typical stakeholders
that characterize design, construction and management activities in the real estate
area.
The aim was to go beyond the state-of-the-art about carbon footprint issue in buildings, adopting, experimenting, and testing innovative solutions. As a starting point,
of course, the selected environmental approach took into account elements/indicators
that are typically considered in the various environmental certifications with voluntary adhesion present in the Italian market (e.g., ITACA protocol, LEED certification,
CasaClima, and Well) paying attention to elements such as user well-being, water
and other natural resources management, energy and pollutant consumption, materials, site features, and integration in the context, relations, and mobility systems.
All of these issues were addressed in order to reach levels of excellence with respect
to the possibilities provided by technologies and indeed by introducing solutions
of strong process and product innovation. In addition to this, in the environmental
assessment model proposed, the users and their behavior during the use phase were
also introduced as fundamental elements both to measure the real impacts of the
intervention and to allow, through continuous monitoring and rewarding solutions,
the progressive improvement of the “building-human being” system with respect
to the issues of environmental sustainability, the use of resources, the response to
climate change, quality of life, and the construction of a “resilient community.”
Therefore, the final choice was to launch an ambitious challenge in which the
environmental values of building interventions, deriving from human being-building
interaction, would have been really monitored and verified also during the use phase
to support the introduced tools for the correction and continuous improvement of
environmental performance. This was done because the measurements made once
the buildings are in use normally show a substantial difference between design forecasts in terms of consumption/impact up to 200% (Lehmann et al. 2017). Moreover,
the human factor or “human behavior” is normally not considered or assessed in
environmental protocols, even if human behavior in energy consumption alone can
produce variations with respect to design forecasts of between 10 and 80% (van
Dronkelaar et al. 2016).
For this reason, in order to reduce to the minimum the environmental impacts—
with the ultimate goal of eliminating any impact over a time span of 50 years, which
was the duration defined for the project during the structuring phase of the initiative—
a number of specific solutions were introduced in the final project.