SBE Projects

Urban metabolism, knowledge and applications in urban planning and design

Associated projects:

Using Urban Metabolism to analyse Fuel Poverty in Reading (2018)
Principal investigator: Daniela Perrotti, with Eugene Mohareb.
The project aims to apply models for urban metabolism analysis to assess the fuel poverty issue in Reading. Reading will be used as a case study to generalise results to other small UK cities with similar demographic and socioeconomic profiles. The students will use data collected during a previous study of the metabolism of Reading, which employed the Material Flow Analysis (MFA) methodology (input-output quantification of water, energy, reused/landfilled waste, and carbon dioxide emissions by sectors). Funded through the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Programme (UROP), University of Reading. Project link

INSIGHT: Integrated strategies for inclusive growth, resource-efficiency and urban resilience (2018)
Principal investigator: Daniela Perrotti with University of Portsmouth, UK, and Xi’an Jiaotong University, China
UK-China Urban Regeneration and Sustainable Communities Leadership Workshop (Xi’an, China), sponsored by the British Council – Newton Fund. The main aim of the INSIGHT workshop is to promote the international exchange of knowledge and experiences around novel theories, strategies and methods on urban regeneration, applying integrated strategies for inclusive growth, resource-efficiency and urban resilience. The applicants are experts in the field of inclusive urban regeneration and resource efficiency. Project link.

UK Cities Urban Metabolism and Energy Transitions: A taxonomy of cities (2017-2020)
Principal Investigator: Christina Bristow. PhD Co-Supervisor: Daniela Perrotti; with Dr. Eugene Mohareb and Dr. Phil Coker.
UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) Doctoral Training Partnership. This doctoral research project features an exploration of resource requirements in UK cities using urban metabolism modelling methods. Project link

Quantifying Reading’s Urban Metabolism (2017)
Principal investigator: Daniela Perrotti; with Dr. Eugene Mohareb
Undergraduate Research Opportunity Programme (UROP), University of Reading. Two students worked in collaboration with Reading Borough Council to quantify resource consumption in the local area. This project fell under the research area of “urban metabolism” which is a resource flow accounting application to quantify the needs of urban areas and explore how they can transition to more sustainable levels of resource consumption. Project link

Application of energy-conscious design principles in planning and design: sustainable energy landscapes (2015 – 2018)
PhD investigator: Roberta Pistoni, with Daniela Perrotti, Wageningen University, Landscape Architecture Chair Group, and School of Landscape Architecture of Versailles, Laboratoire de Recherche en Projet de Paysage Larep.
French Ministry for the Environment ITTECOP / ARENE Île-de-France. A PhD research project examining the design principles that promote rational energy management, to support the planning and delivery of sustainable energy landscapes. Project link.

UK Cities urban metabolism

PhD researcher: Christina Bristow

This doctoral research project features an exploration of resource requirements in UK cities using urban metabolism modelling methods. As such, an “organism” metaphor will be employed with the aim of developing a “taxonomy” of urban areas. Drivers such as urban energy, water, material and food demands and their relationship to local infrastructure will be researched, with a particular focus on urban heat.
Spatially and temporally explicit urban metabolic models will be developed. Considerations of taxonomy and these urban metabolism models will then be used in a group of selected UK case study cities to examine infrastructural change for low-carbon systems of the future. There will be a focus on the transition to carbon-free heating options, widening our understanding of which options are most suitable in different UK contexts. Spatially and temporally explicit urban metabolic models will be developed to aid in decision making for changing building and infrastructure stocks.

The project will seek collaboration with a diverse set of UK cities and urban areas to serve as case studies for validation of the metabolic profiles developed. These will include varying metabolic needs to serve a variety of economic activities and infrastructure systems. Ultimately the exploration of the interrelationship between these and their temporal and spatial dynamics will enable new insight in planning for regional transitions to low-carbon systems.

Urban ecosystem services and integration in Urban Metabolism frameworks

Associated projects:

Urban metabolism modelling for sustainable green infrastructure development in rapidly urbanized mid-sized cities in Brazil (2018)

Principle investigator: Daniela Perrotti with Federal University of Mato Grosso (Brazil), University of Leeds (UK), Dr. Vincent Luo and Dr. Eugene Mohareb (University of Reading)

UK Global Challenge Research Fund Pump-Priming Grant. A case study in Rondonópolis, Mato Grosso.

Integrating Ecosystem Services in Urban Metabolism Frameworks for Climate-responsive and Energy-saving Green Infrastructure Design (2015)

Principle investigator: Daniela Perrotti with Wageningen University and Research Centre, Landscape Architecture Chair Group, The Netherlands.

WIMEK Senior Research Grant, Wageningen Institute for Environment and Climate Research.

Landscape Design and Sustainable Energy Transition in Peri-Urban Areas (2012-2014)

Principle investigator: Daniela Perrotti

Research Fellowship, Research Network on Sustainable Development R2DS Ile-de-France, France. Academic affiliation: Dept. Science for Action and Sustainable Development (SAD-APT), National Institute for Agricultural Research INRA Versailles-Grignon, France

Interdisciplinary Action research Landscapes Design & Energy Transition (2012-2013)

Principle investigator: Daniela Perrotti

National Institute for Agricultural Research INRA Versailles-Grignon.

The Library: physicality and enactment (PhD Thesis)

Lead investigator: Hiral Patel

The purpose of the PhD research was to study adaptations of a building after it was constructed, and, in doing so, to explicate a novel conception of what a building is. Moving beyond the conception of buildings as fixed physical objects, a practice-based approach is adopted to conceptualise a building as a series of enactments. The practices of enacting a building illustrate how overly simplified design speculations are defied. Design strategies for adaptability of buildings often assume that adaptability resides in the physicality of the building. Instead, this research suggests that adaptability resides in the relations of the physical building with heterogonous entities. The building is, thus, a fluid object. The fluidity of buildings challenge scalar differentiations, and in turn reveal how a desk in the library is connected to the wider urban environment of the campus. Moreover, multiple versions of the library co-exist. Adaptations of a building are imbued with the ‘politics-of-what’ in prioritising one version of the library over other versions. The physicality of the building is manipulated in such politics. This has implications for renewal of building design practices to become sensitive to the ways in which multiple versions of a building may be politicised.

Exhibition

‘Enactments of the Library’, curated in the Library Building, University of Reading in November 2014 to mark the celebration of 50th anniversary of the building. The exhibition was part of University of Reading Alumni event. The exhibition provided an opportunity to actively participate in the community being researched. In making the exhibition and transgressing my identity from ‘observer’ to ‘participant’, I was able to gain new access to people, places and artefacts in the field. The exhibition provided an example of simultaneity of data collection, data analysis and demonstrating research output.

The DEGW Archive, 2016-present

Lead Investigator: Hiral Patel

The  research project focuses on the DEGW archive, capturing the first 25 years of the work of the spatial and architectural consultancy DEGW. The research mobilises the concept of a ‘living archive’ through curatorial methodology.  The archive is continuously enriched by curating exhibitions and events, often crafted in collaboration with members of the DEGW diaspora.  The exhibitions and events create space to reflect on current issues relating to the design and research of the built environment in light of the lessons learnt from the archive.

Click here for more information. 

Sustainable Neighbourhood Masterplans

Examining the role of BREEAM Communities in green infrastructure evaluation

Lead investigator: Rosalie Callway, with Tim Dixon and Dragana Nikolic

Evaluation of Green infrastructure (GI) is reported to improve decision-making and outcomes in neighbourhood design, but there is little research that examines the links between GI evaluation and masterplan outcomes. An empirical study of six English master planned residential sites was carried out of three broad types of neighbourhood development (estate regeneration, urban infill, and rural-urban extension). In each of the three types two pairs of sties were studied, one site which adopted BREEAM Communities (BC) and one had not. This supported an examination of whether BC affected GI evaluative practice and masterplan decisions. A series of ‘evaluative episodes’ were studied across the six sites, using a Strategy-as-Practice framework to trace how different actors viewed specific types of GI (e.g. street trees, green roofs, soft Sustainable Drainage Systems (SUDS)), how the GI was formally evaluated in the course of the episodes and whether the application of BC affected that evaluation. Potential ways to enhance GI evaluative embeddedness in masterplan processes were also reviewed as a part of the study.

Associated publications

Callway, R., Dixon, T. and Nikolic, D. (2016) BREEAM Communities: Challenges for Sustainable Neighbourhood Evaluation, RICS COBRA September 2016.

Callway, R., Dixon, T. and Nikolic, D. (2017) Embedded evaluation? Examining green infrastructure evaluation in  the neighbourhood masterplan journey. ARCOM, September 2017

Social Sustainability and Social Value in UK Housebuilding

Building on previous work led by Tim Dixon for the European Investment Bank on social sustainability in urban regeneration, this work has developed (with Social Life) a social sustainability assessment framework for UK housing projects. This uses national datasets and survey work to assess four main dimensions: ‘amenities and infrastructure’; ‘social and cultural life’; and ‘voice and influence’. The framework has been applied in a range of new housing developments for Berkeley Group and Countryside properties, and the work has also helped inform recent practice guidance on social value for the UK Green Building Council.

Smart Cities and Big Data in the Built Environment

Lead Investigator: Tim Dixon

This work was funded by RICS Research Trust and led by Tim Dixon. The interconnected agendas of smart cities, big data and open data, on the face of it, provide bold and exciting opportunities for built environment professionals. With a focus at the city level, this research examines the development of data platforms in the UK and internationally, and determines how professionals in the built environment can benefit from them. The research identified four key barriers to the development of big data projects in the built environment:

  • A lack of consistency in the definitions and measurement of built environment big data.
  • A low level of built environment sector business engagement.
  • The lack of interoperability between different varieties of datasets.

The present lack of a ‘bottom-up’, demand-focused approach to the smart cities agenda.

Research-Practice knowledge transfer to inform advanced Urban Metabolism modelling

Associated projects:

Transferring Urban Metabolism Knowledge from Research to Practice. A Real-World Test in Helsinki (2013)

Principle researcher: Daniela Perrotti
Research Grant: Kone Foundation. Aalto University, Department of Architecture, Finland.

Reading 2050

The Reading 2050 project was established in 2013 to deliver a strategic, long-term vision that will support growth and prosperity in Reading, and help ensure that a truly smart and sustainable city can be delivered by 2050. The project was ‘co-created’ as a partnership between the University of Reading (School of the Built Environment), Barton Willmore and Reading UK CIC. Tim Dixon leads the input from the University and the work has used innovative urban foresight and city visioning techniques. The project has connected to the Government Office of Science Future of Cities work and is cited in Reading Borough Council’s Local Plan. Further funding bids and research projects are being developed as a result of this research.

Click here for further information