Journal article
High water use plants influence green roof substrate temperatures and their insulative benefits
Andrea Pianella, Zheng Zhang, Claire Farrell, Lu Aye, Zhengdong Chen, Nicholas SG Williams
Nature-Based Solutions | Elsevier BV | Published : 2023
Abstract
Green roofs are amongst the solutions employed to deliver sustainable buildings in cities. Their vegetation and substrate layers can reduce the heat transfer through the roof, thus potentially reducing energy used for building cooling and heating. However, little research has investigated the insulative properties of drought-tolerant plants which also have high water use. These plants have been found to improve runoff retention by removing larger volumes of water from the substrate through higher transpiration rates than succulents. This planting strategy may also enhance green roof cooling performance due to their greater evapotranspiration rates. In this study, the thermal performance of ..
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Grants
Awarded by Australian Research Council
Funding Acknowledgements
This research was funded by Australian Research Council Linkage grant LP130100731 supported by Melbourne Water and Inner Melbourne Action Plan (IMAP) municipal councils. Andrea Pianella is supported by the Melbourne International Research Scholarship (MIRS) and Melbourne International Fee Remission Scholarship (MIFRS). Authors would like to thank Mr Joerg Werdin, Dr Matthew Chick and Dr Ruzana Sanusi for their help in setting up the thermal sensors, Assoc. Prof. Dongryeol Ryu and Mrs Danuta Kucharska for lending and training in the use of the cropscan, Dr Guillermo Narsilio and Mr Amir Orangi for the use of instrumentations in the Geotechnical Soil and Water Lab. A special thanks to Mr Fabio Polosa for his invaluable help and support with Photoshop.