Urban sustainability assessment of neighborhoods in Lombardy

Abstract The paper presents a contextualized system useful in the decision-making of Public Administrators for analysis and actions concerning urban sustainability and for monitoring neighborhood transformation processes. The system is developed with an approach made up by Inputs (available data from standards and laws and state-of-the-art), Controls (i.e. technical skills of Public Administrators) and Mechanisms (know-how and software used) which implement Outputs, the main elements of the system: Sustainability indicators, Benchmarks and Scores. The set of indicators chosen allows to consider many aspects of environmental sustainability as Resource Consumption (Energy, Materials, Water, Soil) and Environmental Impacts (Pollutant Emissions, Wastes and Vulnerability). The objective parameters of the indicators are based on a benchmarking activity in relation to the Lombardy context and in order to provide reachable target performance. Finally, a baseline of weighted scores of indicators is proposed to allow to reach a final overall score of sustainability of the neighborhood

Development of an Indoor Environmental Quality Assessment Tool for the Rating of Offices in Real Working Conditions

The Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) refers to the quality of indoor spaces in relation to the health and well-being of users. IEQ is a holistic concept considering various components of the overall indoor comfort: thermo-hygrometric, lighting, air quality and acoustics. Each component is described through specific performance indicators and benchmarks. The quality of the built environment is assessed at different stages from design to operational phase. The scientific literature reports several case studies related to the assessment of the individual components of the IEQ Tools aimed at the evaluation of the overall IEQ. The paper proposes an assessment tool based on the SB Method (Sustainable Building Method) and the Multi Criteria Analysis for the evaluation of IEQ during the operational phase of a building. Each component of IEQ is analysed through objective indicators and calculation methods. The tool provides two main outcomes: a global score expressing the overall performance of the building from the IEQ perspective; quantitative evaluations of all indoor comfort components through monitoring and measurement of the environmental variables. The above contributes to select intervention areas to optimize indoor design and to identify technologies aimed at ensuring the best IEQ levels for users at the operational stage. The system was applied to an open-plan working space of an office building. Monitoring activities and measurements are carried out to detect the indoor and outdoor variables affecting the IEQ. All aspects of IEQ were analysed and quantified so to evaluate the overall performance of the building and provide data to improve the working conditions

1130 Supporting sustainable policies through an Urban Energy-Environmental Model and a Multi-Criteria Analysis: a case study in an Italian province

Public Authorities (PAs) need to define cross-cutting strategies for urban planning including policies for sustainable and energy-efficient buildings and innovative urban solutions. The article presents a decision support tool that combines an Urban Energy Environmental Model (UEEM) and a Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) to support the development of sustainable local policies. The UEEM, developed with a bottom-up approach incorporating energy and environmental items, provides a~representation of the performance of local urban areas and quantifies the impact of new interventions in expansion areas. The UEEM is based on the definition of virtual archetypes built on the characteristics of the area under consideration. 92 building archetypes and 40 urban archetypes are developed. The energy performance of each building archetype is calculated with a dynamic simulation tool. The environmental performance of urban areas (overheating risk and outdoor thermal comfort) is analysed through a Grasshopper-based parametric model. In addition, soil permeability is calculated. The UEEM results are aggregated into a single index using the MCA, providing a Municipal Rating Index (MRI). The weights of the MCA are estimated through the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) based on a survey submitted to local stakeholders (municipalities, environmental associations, experts). The model is applied to the province of Monza and Brianza in northern Italy

Urban sustainability assessment of neighborhoods in Lombardy

Abstract The paper presents a contextualized system useful in the decision-making of Public Administrators for analysis and actions concerning urban sustainability and for monitoring neighborhood transformation processes. The system is developed with an approach made up by Inputs (available data from standards and laws and state-of-the-art), Controls (i.e. technical skills of Public Administrators) and Mechanisms (know-how and software used) which implement Outputs, the main elements of the system: Sustainability indicators, Benchmarks and Scores. The set of indicators chosen allows to consider many aspects of environmental sustainability as Resource Consumption (Energy, Materials, Water, Soil) and Environmental Impacts (Pollutant Emissions, Wastes and Vulnerability). The objective parameters of the indicators are based on a benchmarking activity in relation to the Lombardy context and in order to provide reachable target performance. Finally, a baseline of weighted scores of indicators is proposed to allow to reach a final overall score of sustainability of the neighborhood

Working from Home in Italy during COVID-19 Lockdown: A Survey to Assess the Indoor Environmental Quality and Productivity

Italians were the first European citizens to experience the lockdown due to Sars-Cov-2 in March 2020. Most employees were forced to work from home. People suddenly had to share common living spaces with family members for longer periods of time and convert home spaces into workplaces. This inevitably had a subjective impact on the perception, satisfaction and preference of indoor environmental quality and work productivity. A web-based survey was designed and administered to Italian employees to determine how they perceived the indoor environmental quality of residential spaces when Working From Home (WFH) and to investigate the relationship between different aspects of users’ satisfaction. A total of 330 valid questionnaires were collected and analysed. The article reports the results of the analyses conducted using a descriptive approach and predictive models to quantify comfort in living spaces when WFH, focusing on respondents’ satisfaction. Most of them were satisfied with the indoor environmental conditions (89% as the sum of “very satisfied” and “satisfied” responses for thermal comfort, 74% for visual comfort, 68% for acoustic quality and 81% for indoor air quality), while the layout of the furniture negatively influenced the WFH experience: 45% of the participants expressed an unsatisfactory or neutral opinion. The results of the sentiment analysis confirmed this trend. Among the Indoor Environmental factors that affect productivity, visual comfort is the most relevant variable. As for the predictive approach using machine learning, the Support Vector Machine classifier performed best in predicting overall satisfaction