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The design and assessment of net-zero buildings commonly focus exclusively on the operational phase, ignoring the embodied environmental impacts over the building life cycle. An analysis is presented on the consequences of integrating embodied impacts into the assessment of the environmental advantageousness of net-zero concepts. Fundamental issues needing consideration in the design process - based on the evaluation of primary energy use and related greenhouse gas emissions - are examined by comparing three net-zero building design and assessment cases: (1) no embodied impacts included, net balance limited to the operation stage only; (2) embodied impacts included but evaluated separately from the operation stage; and (3) embodied impacts included with the operation stage in a life cycle approach. A review of recent developments in research, standardization activities and design practice and the presentation of a case study of a residential building in Norway highlight the critical importance of performance indicator definitions and system boundaries. A practical checklist is presented to guide the process of incorporating embodied impacts across the building life cycle phases in net-zero design. Its implications are considered on overall environmental impact assessment of buildings. Research and development challenges, as well as recommendations for designers and other stakeholders, are identified.

Earth observation (EO) data are useful tools to analyse geomorphological processes, among which slow-moving landslides triggered by rainfall. EO data are also used to evaluate climate change and to assess its impact on geomorphological processes and geo-hydrological phenomena. The latter is the topic of the Project OT4Clima (Innovative Earth Observation technologies to study Climate Change and its impact on the environment) joined by CNR-IRPI within a consortium that includes other CNR institutes, universities and private companies. The OT4CLIMA project moves from the awareness that the impacts of climate change on the environment need to be better observed, understood, and modelled, especially at a regional scale, in order to put in place appropriate and effective risk mitigation strategies. Within the project, the CNR-IRPI group works on the development of rigorous methods and procedures for evaluating the impact of climate and its change on landslides, in particular on those characterized by a slow cinematic, at a regional scale. The test site is represented by four catchments located in the Basilicata region, southern Italy, namely the basins of the Bradano, Basento, Agri, and Sinni rivers. Long-term rainfall series gathered from 22 rain gauges located in the four catchments are analysed to evaluate the presence of temporal trends. To this aim, non-parametric and statistical tests are applied to the series. Historical landslide information is gathered from the analysis of the IFFI (Inventario dei Fenomeni Franosi in Italia) database, the Idrogeo platform (https://idrogeo.isprambiente.it/app/) and the AVI (Aree Vulnerate in Italia) catalogue. Only some types of landslide movements are considered, namely rotational-translational slides, slow slides/flows, complex movements. Moreover, Copernicus Sentinel-1 images are employed to detect the spatial and temporal distribution of slow earth surface deformations. The obtained results are used for checking the completeness of the landslide inventories. More in detail, the deformation maps of the test site are obtained by means of the application of the SBAS (Small BAseline Subset) technique to three datasets of Sentinel-1 images: t146 ascending orbit and t51 and t124 descending orbits, for the period 2015-2020. Then, a comparative analysis of rainfall data with displacement series is carried out with the aim of identifying clusters of satellite measurements with homogeneous behaviour likely correlated to variations in the rainfall regime. In particular, only the points with a mean velocity in the observation higher than 0.1 cm/year are considered to be moving. Moreover, only the displacement series of points located in areas mapped as landslides - as for the historical inventories - and sited within the influence regions of each rain gauge in the study area are analysed. A 10-km circular buffer centred in the stations are used to define the influence region of each station. The displacement series are analysed and compared to the rainfall series to search for correlations and to evaluate the effects of climate drivers on slow moving landslides.

The building and construction sector is a large contributor to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and consumes vast natural resources. Improvements in this sector are of fundamental importance for national and global targets to combat climate change. In this context, vertical greenery systems (VGS) in buildings have become popular in urban areas to restore green space in cities and be an adaptation strategy for challenges such as climate change. However, only a small amount of knowledge is available on the different VGS environmental impacts. This paper discusses a comparative life cycle assessment (LCA) between a building with green walls, a building with green facades and a reference building without any greenery system in the continental Mediterranean climate. This life cycle assessment is carried according to ISO 14040/44 using ReCiPe and GWP indicators. Moreover, this study fills this gap by thoroughly tracking and quantifying all impacts in all phases of the building life cycle related to the manufacturing and construction stage, maintenance, use stage (operational energy use experimentally tested), and final disposal. The adopted functional unit is the square meter of the facade. Results showed that the operational stage had the highest impact contributing by up to 90% of the total environmental impacts during its 50 years life cycle. Moreover, when considering VGS, there is an annual reduction of about 1% in the environmental burdens. However, in summer, the reduction is almost 50%. Finally, if the use stage is excluded, the manufacturing and the maintenance stage are the most significant contributors, especially in the green wall system.

AbstractClimate change effects along with anthropogenic activities present the main factors that threaten the existence of heritage sites across the north Nile Delta of Egypt close to the coastline of the Mediterranean Sea. Observing the changes in the landscape close to the archaeological sites is an important issue for decision‐makers in terms of reducing the negative impact of natural events and human activities. The coastal heritage sites are becoming strongly threatened by the rising sea level phenomena that will happen due to global warming. Focusing on the distribution of the archaeological sites, this study aims to detect the areas at risk of shoreline erosion or accretion in the northern shoreline of the Nile Delta. In this study, the changes in the northern shoreline of the Nile Delta were observed and calculated during the last hundred years based on the integration between the old topographic maps from surveys in 1900, 1925 and 1945, optical satellite images captured by Landsat in 1972, 1986 and 2000; Sentinel2 2021; and the Radar SRTM data. The results of this study showed that the changes were enormous with a great shoreline erosion process over the last 121 years recorded along the shoreline in the periods between 1900–1925, 1925–1945, 1945–1972, 1972–1986, 1986–2000 and 2000–2021. The areas eroded were about 5.3, 4.7, 5.6, 8.9, 2.5 and 5.4 km2, respectively. Such negative movements caused the loss of two heritage sites, and the expected changes will lead to the loss of additional heritage sites in the next 500 years. Furthermore, a model was suggested for protecting the coastal heritage sites threatened by the risk of submergence. This study can help the decision‐makers to detect the coastal archaeological sites at risk and create innovative solutions for protecting these irreplaceable heritage sites.

It is well known that the efficiency of PV modules decreases with increasing module temperatures. Many studies have paid attention to the development and validation of heuristic models to calculate the PV module temperature in higher latitudes, however only a few focus on the thermal behaviour of PV modules in tropical regions of the world, where constantly high temperatures prevail. Also, little is known about the effect of including wind speed in these thermal models. This study evaluates three of such models - one that excludes wind, and two others including the wind influence - using hourly data for two tropical locations. Results show that the average hourly wind speeds in Singapore and Jayapura (Indonesia) are low and therefore the influence of the wind on the PV module temperature is minor. The three evaluated models produce about the same results with RMSE between 1.5-3.8 °C during daytime, which corresponds to a deviation in power output in the range of 0.3-1.6 %, depending on the PV module technology.

AbstractThe potential impacts of future climate scenarios on water balance and flow regime are presented and discussed for a temporary river system in southern Italy. Different climate projections for the future (2030–2059) and the recent conditions (1980–2009) were investigated. A hydrological model (Soil and Water Assessment Tool) was used to simulate water balance at the basin scale and streamflow in a number of river sections under various climate change scenarios, based on different combinations of global and regional models (global circulation models and regional climate models). The impact on water balance components was quantified at the basin and subbasin levels as deviation from the baseline (1980–2009), and the flow regime alteration under changing climate was estimated using a number of hydrological indicators. An increase in mean temperature for all months between 0.5–2.4 °C and a reduction in precipitation (by 4–7%) was predicted for the future. As a consequence, a decline of blue water (7–18%) and total water yield (11–28%) was estimated. Although the river type classification remains unvaried, the flow regime distinctly moves towards drier conditions and the divergence from the current status increases in future scenarios, especially for those reaches classified as I‐D (ie, intermittent‐dry) and E (ephemeral). Hydrological indicators showed a decrease in both high flow and low flow magnitudes for various time durations, an extension of the dry season and an exacerbation of extreme low flow conditions. A reduction of snowfall in the mountainous part of the basin and an increase in potential evapotranspiration was also estimated (4–4.4%). Finally, the paper analyses the implications of the climate change for river ecosystems and for River Basin Management Planning. The defined quantitative estimates of water balance alteration could support the identification of priorities that should be addressed in upcoming years to set water‐saving actions.

This paper analyzes different policies that may promote the transition to sustainability, with a particular focus on the energy sector. We present a dynamic simulation model where three different strategies for sustainability are identified: reduction in GHG emissions, improvements in energy efficiency and the development of the renewable energy sector. Our aim is to evaluate the dynamics that those strategies may produce in the economy, looking at different performance indicators: rate of growth, unemployment, fiscal position, GHG emission, and transition to renewable energy sources.