Search results for " environmental assessment."
showing 10 items of 18 documents
Disintegration of Italian rural landscapes to international environmental agreements
2015
In Italy, the first law that puts landscape and historical buildings under public control was implemented in 1922. While this represents a significant achievement for those times, for that law landscape essentially has an historical and aesthetic connotation, without any explicit reference to the components of flora, fauna and geology. Today, many protection policies and initiatives are still biased by the lack of reference to the intrinsic value that biodiversity and ecosystem services have for the maintenance of traditional landscapes, as well as for the survival of the human species. The priority accorded to historical and aesthetic values can lead to a lack of attention to the complex r…
Environmentally Assessing Buildings Characterized by Complex Shape and Innovative Materials
2013
This paper addresses the emerging problem consisting in a correct energy and environmental evaluation of buildings belonging to the new architectural tendency. In fact, innovative buildings are often characterized by new materials that, not rarely, are not contemplated in current environmental databases. Moreover, unconventional shapes of these buildings could require further manufacturing processes that involve additional energy consumption not included in the commercial environmental database. Through the work a spotlighting of the problem is presented with reference to a real innovative building.
Similarities and Differences in the Evaluative Methods
2016
The awareness in the last few years surrounding the use of natural resources and landscape transformations has led to the development of several tools designed to evaluate the effects of human actions on them. The environmental evaluation methods, born in the USA, have known different disciplinary evolutions according to the following factors: firstly, regarding the object to assess; secondly, pertaining to the national juridical framework; and thirdly, relating to the progress in this field. Today we can affirm that we have, more or less, as many assessment techniques as countries. In fact, other than the Environmental Assessment Impact and Strategic Environmental Assessment, common to dif…
Energy and environmental benefits in public buildings as a result of retrofit actions
2011
Abstract The paper presents the results of an energy and environmental assessment of a set of retrofit actions implemented in the framework of the EU Project “BRITA in PuBs” (Bringing Retrofit Innovation to Application in Public Buildings – no: TREN/04/FP6EN/S07.31038/503135). Outcomes arise from a life cycle approach focused on the following issues: (i) construction materials and components used during retrofits; (ii) main components of conventional and renewable energy systems; (iii) impacts related to the building construction, for the different elements and the whole building. The results are presented according to the data format of the Environmental Product Declaration. Synthetic indi…
Testing the usability of the Rapid Impact Assessment Matrix (RIAM) method for comparison of EIA and SEA results
2008
Abstract This study examines how the results of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) could be compared using the Rapid Impact Assessment Matrix (RIAM) method. There are many tools and techniques that have been developed for use in impact assessment processes, including scoping, checklists, matrices, qualitative and quantitative models, literature reviews, and decision-support systems. While impact assessment processes have become more technically complicated, it is recognized that approaches including simpler applications of available tools and techniques are also appropriate. The Rapid Impact Assessment Matrix (RIAM) is a tool for organizing, a…
An integrated and shared approach to sea of the regional town master plan of Sicily
2006
The work addresses one of the most important problems in contemporary environmental land planning. Already existing procedures, in fact, must now conform to the new requirements imposed by the recent national and international regulations and standards that call for a more conscious approach to the use of natural resources. Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA), for example, takes into account, the different effects of a plan in various fields such as the environment, the economy and the development. This obviously calls for global analysis tools that could help administrators, stakeholders and technicians in the decision-making process of such complex systems. SEA of the Town Master Pla…
Strategic Environmental Assessment: Integrating Landscape and Urban Planning
2016
This book explores the opportunities offered by Strategic Environmental Assessment in the context of guaranteeing the synchronized integration of landscape (in all its aspects) within urban plans, thereby helping to overcome the constraints of rigidly framed, sector-focused laws and a purely aesthetic concept of landscape. In pursuit of this goal, various scholars have previously attempted to construct arrays of indicators relating to the different conceptions of “landscape”. This book critically examines the most complete proposals of this nature, systematizing and comparing them and, finally, offering some guidelines with respect to their codification within specific application protocols…
An Italian Urban “Fashion” The Urban 1 Programme as a Catalyst for Institutional Planning Shift
2014
Since the 1990s Italy has been going through changes and experiments concerning modes and tools of urban government. New methods, based on publicprivate partnership, on a consensual basis, were progressively adopted, overcoming the traditional authoritative mechanisms and role of public actors. The contribution of Community policies such as initiatives on urban areas, has been crucial in creating new tools, influencing the existing ones and activating new approaches to planning. This paper builds some theoretical considerations on the contributions the implementation of European Programmes has given to the changes in the conception of urban interventions and thedebated shift in urban polic…
Energy and environmental assessment of powder and structured Ni/GDC catalysts
2019
Power -to-Gas technologies have been recently introduced as a relevant strategy allowing higher shares of renewable generation in the energy sector
Foreword 2 in Strategic Environmental Assessment: Integrating Landscape and Urban Planning
2016
Il contributo costituisce l'introduzione al volume di Fabio Cutaia, che raccoglie gli studi da lui avviati negli anni del dottorato di ricerca in pianificazione e continuati successivamente in occasione di varie esperienze di ricerca in contesti nazionali ed internazionali. Il lavoro di Fabio Cutaia, attraverso un attento esame delle questioni aperte e di casi di studio, consente di pervenire ad una prima sistematizzazione del tema della Valutazione ambientale strategica in particolare per quanto attiene il ruolo che tale valuzione può avere nel riconnettere le discipline della pianificazione urbanistica e della pianificazione del paesaggio. Il testo, sviluppando in dettaglio la questione d…