Comparative Life Cycle Assessment of Standard and Green Roofs

Abstract

Life cycle assessment (LCA) is used to evaluate the benefits, primarily from reduced energy consumption, resulting from the addition of a green roof to an eight story residential building in Madrid. Building energy use is simulated and a bottom-up LCA is conducted assuming a 50 year building life. The key property of a green roof is its low solar absorptance, which causes lower surface temperature, thereby reducing the heat flux through the roof. Savings in annual energy use are just over 1%, but summer cooling load is reduced by over 6% and reductions in peak hour cooling load in the upper floors reach 25%. By replacing the common flat roof with a green roof, environmental impacts are reduced by between 1.0 and 5.3%. Similar reductions might be achieved by using a white roof with additional insulation for winter, but more substantial reductions are achieved if common use of green roofs leads to reductions in the urban heat island.

A Mass Balance Model for Designing Green Roof Systems that Incorporate a Cistern for Re-Use

“…Green roof stormwater treatment systems are a sustainable solution to this problem of water retention without using more land while offering several other benefits [26][27][28][29]. It is shown in this paper that an irrigated green roof with a cistern is an effective way to reduce the volume of stormwater runoff from rooftops.…”

Using natural means to reduce surface transport noise during propagation outdoors

“…In addition, there are many advantages for the environment, ranging from increasing the thermal insulation of the building envelope and reduction of urban heat island effects [127][128][129][130][131][132][133][134][135], acting as a buffer for storm water [135][136][137][138][139][140], improving air quality and increased carbon-dioxide uptake [141][142][143], increasing urban biodiversity [144][145][146][147], providing a visually pleasant environment [148], to even crop harvesting. Also from an economical point of view, building greening seems interesting [149][150][151][152].…”

Application of green blue roof to mitigate heat island phenomena and resilient to climate change in urban areas: A case study from Seoul, Korea

“…This large amount of area if convert into green roofs can give many benefits in an urban area, including stormwater management [HOSSAIN, BAHAUDDIN 2013;SHAFIQUE et al 2016;SURMA 2015], control heat waves [FENG et al 2013;SANTAMOURIS 2014], increase biodiversity, improve the air quality of an area [LUO 2009], increase life span of the building, reduction in noise, and energy consumption costs [LUO 2009;SAIZ et al 2016;XIAO et al 2014]. Green roofs are sustainable stormwater management approach in the urban areas [SHAFIQUE et al 2016].…”

“…Green roofs are sustainable stormwater management approach in the urban areas [SHAFIQUE et al 2016]. Green roof increases the evapotranspiration rate and decreases heat island phenomena and reduces the energy consumption costs [SAIZ et al 2016]. TANG et al [2007] applied green roof at Chongqing, China to check the performance of green roof for temperature reduction.…”