Search results for " tower"
showing 10 items of 50 documents
Vibration Tests and Structural Identification of the Bell Tower of Palermo Cathedral
2019
Background: The recent seismic events in Italy have underlined once more the need for seismic prevention for historic constructions of architectural interest and in general, the building heritage. During the above-mentioned earthquakes, different masonry monumental buildings have been lost due to the intrinsic vulnerability and ageing that reduced the structural member strength. This has made the community understand more that prevention is a necessary choice for the protection of monuments. Objective: The paper aims at demonstrating a strategy of investigation providing the possibility of health judgment, identifying a computational model for the assessment of structural capacity under se…
Design of a telescopic tower for wind energy production with reduced environmental impact
2019
A prototype of a telescopic pole for wind energy production with low environmental impact and its lifting system for a 60 to 250 kW turbine and a height of 30 m have been designed and manufactured. A telescopic tower, which is raised and lowered by automation or by remote control, allows to differentiate the presence of the generator within the landscape over time. The technology currently available for lifting and lowering wind turbines is made up of telescopic poles of heights of less than 10 meters and with tilting posts of height below 30 m. Without a state of the art to refer to, the telescopic pole and its lifting system have been designed starting from scratch and solving with innova…
Effects of rainfall events on the evapotranspiration retrieved by an energy balance model
2009
An alternative way to map the actual evapotranspiration (ET) spatial distribution at daily scale is the application of residual surface energy balance models to satellite images that are characterised by high temporal frequency and moderate spatial resolution, like those acquired by the MODIS sensors on board of TERRA and AQUA platforms. Within this research the well-known SEBAL model has been applied on an area located in the southern part of Sicily (Imera Meridionale catchment) using four images acquired between the 27th of March and the 11th of April 2007. The catchment extends for about 2000 km2 and includes both mountains and hill areas: the first are located in the northern part (the …
Energy-saving potential of ground source multiple chillers in simple and hybrid configurations for Mediterranean climates
2022
Air conditioning accounts for a large share of energy usage in residential and tertiary sectors. Renewable energy technologies offer promising solutions to reduce the environmental impacts of meeting buildings’ energy loads. The possibility of using the soil as a thermal reservoir for heating and cooling systems has gained growing attention in the last decade due to its high potential for energy saving. In this paper, the benefits achievable using ground source chillers for air conditioning in an office building located in Southern Italy are discussed. A multiple chillers system coupled with a borehole heat exchanger is investigated and compared to conventional air-cooled and water-cooled s…
Analytical studies of the Sirocco room of Villa Naselli-Ambleri: A XVI century passive cooling structure in Palermo (Sicily)
2015
Abstract This work focuses on a passive cooling architecture particularly popular from the Renaissance in Palermo area, as building sumptuous suburban villas became a real hobby for the Sicilian aristocracy. A Sirocco room is an artificial subterranean construction, built close to a water spring in order to reproduce the pleasant conditions of freshness that could be experienced in a natural cavern. In these places, nobles used to spend their time with friends to escape from the hot summer. The room of Villa Naselli-Ambleri is nowadays the best preserved in Palermo thanks to its owners’ conservation care and it is unique for its cooling operating principle. The above-mentioned consideration…
L'ANTICO CAMPANILE DELLA CATTEDRALE DI LECCE IN UN CONSULTO DEL 1574
2016
L'antico campanile della cattedrale di Lecce si trovava in una posizione diversa rispetto a quello esistente costruito nel 1658. La maestosa torre, con cinque ordini e una terminazione a corona, era collocata di fianco all'antica facciata principale della chiesa, sul lato sinistro. Nel 1574 a causa di numerosi crolli, gli amministratori della chiesa decisero di avvalersi del parere tecnico di tre professionisti: Padoano Schiero, Padoano Baxi e Gabriele Meschinello, chiamati ad esprimersi in merito alla pericolosità di tali crolli e allo stato della torre. Vennero prodotte tre relazioni tecniche i cui contenuti illustravano la necessità di demolire la torre al fine di scongiurare eventuali d…
Un’architettura in divenire: il campanile maggiore della cattedrale di Palermo (XIV-XIX secolo)
2018
Luogo della permanenza, ma talora anche di mutamenti repentini, agevolati tra l’altro dalla vulnerabilità intrinseca alle strutture turriformi, o ancora di stratificazioni che tengono insieme la memoria del tempo pregresso e l’adesione a linguaggi e tecniche di attualità , il campanile riverbera in molti casi cambiamenti e discontinuità nella cultura architettonica dominante in un preciso contesto urbano, in momenti diversi della sua storia , assumendo talora anche valenze mutevoli nel corso del tempo. Di ciò offre un esempio eloquente il campanile maggiore della cattedrale di Palermo. Permanenza e ricostruzione sono i termini, apparentemente antitetici, che sintetizzano una travagliata vic…
Diurnal and Seasonal Solar Induced Chlorophyll Fluorescence and Photosynthesis in a Boreal Scots Pine Canopy
2019
Solar induced chlorophyll fluorescence has been shown to be increasingly an useful proxy for the estimation of gross primary productivity (GPP), at a range of spatial scales. Here, we explore the seasonality in a continuous time series of canopy solar induced fluorescence (hereafter SiF) and its relation to canopy gross primary production (GPP), canopy light use efficiency (LUE), and direct estimates of leaf level photochemical efficiency in an evergreen canopy. SiF was calculated using infilling in two bands from the incoming and reflected radiance using a pair of Ocean Optics USB2000+ spectrometers operated in a dual field of view mode, sampling at a 30 min time step using custom written …
On the Use of the Eddy Covariance Latent Heat Flux and Sap Flow Transpiration for the Validation of a Surface Energy Balance Model
2018
Actual evapotranspiration is assessed via surface energy balance at an hourly rate. However, a robust estimation of daily evapotranspiration from hourly values is required. Outcomes of surface energy balance are frequently determined via measures of eddy covariance latent heat flux. Surface energy balance can be applied on images acquired at different times and spatial resolutions. In addition, hourly actual evapotranspiration needs to be integrated at a daily rate for operational uses. Questions arise whether the validation of surface energy balance models can benefit from complementary in situ measures of latent heat flux and sap flow transpiration. Here, validation was driven by image ac…
How neurophysiological measures can be used to enhance the evaluation of remote tower solutions
2019
New solutions in operational environments are often, among objective measurements, evaluated by using subjective assessment and judgment from experts. Anyhow, it has been demonstrated that subjective measures suffer from poor resolution due to a high intra and inter-operator variability. Also, performance measures, if available, could provide just partial information, since an operator could achieve the same performance but experiencing a different workload. In this study, we aimed to demonstrate: (i) the higher resolution of neurophysiological measures in comparison to subjective ones; and (ii) how the simultaneous employment of neurophysiological measures and behavioral ones could allow a…