Climatopias: Sensing and computational methods in landscape research

Extreme urban heat can severely affect the health and wellbeing of the community, the environment, and the economic performance of cities. Many of these problems are likely to become more severe in the future, partly due to significant urbanisation and densification processes but also because these are exacerbated by the impacts of climate change and global warming. In particular, for those living in Mediterranean climate zones, such as in the Adelaide Metropolitan Region, the effects of an increasingly hotter and drier planet have become more obvious and significant. Reducing urban overheating and improving outdoor thermal comfort conditions are critical aspects that should be addressed by both researchers and practitioners.

However, tackling such a complex (wicked) problem requires developing novel landscape design solutions and approaches informed by defensible scientific evidence and sounding research methods. To investigate cities’ warming processes, advanced and innovative tools in landscape architecture research can be applied to examine the [inter]relationships between urban form, materials, greenery, energy (i.e. energy consumption for heating and cooling, anthropogenic heat, sensible and latent heat, etc.) and carbon emissions.

In this talk, Dr Carlos Bartesaghi Koc will present the most recent research projects he has been involved with, which implemented methods such as GIS (geographic information systems), remote sensing (satellite and airborne-based imagery), meteorological data, point cloud modelling (LiDAR – light detection and ranging), as well as computational tools (Rhinoceros + Grasshopper) and climatic simulation.

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