Buildings
Cleaning the Air
Vertical
Forest
By Rachelle
Burk
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA289215170&v=2.1&u=hatterslib&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w
Summary: In Milan,
Italy the world’s first forest covered buildings are being built. They are
making twin high rise apartment complexes which will be covered in 900 trees
and thousands of different plants. This will be equivalent 108,000 sq. feet of
woodland. The plants are going irrigated with recycled water from the
apartments. The plants will provide shade in the summer and create homes for
birds and insects that are disappearing from cities. The most important thing
the plants will do is filter the air.
This is what
the buildings are expected to look like.
This is a
diagram showing how plants filter air.
Opinion: I think this is a wonderful idea. It
is a great way to filter the air in cities since the air there seems to be
getting worse and worse. It is also great that the plants serve many purposes
like shade and habitats. I think that if this works out in Milan then we should
start trying it in cities all over the world. It is also great that the water
from apartments will be recycled for irrigation.
Questions:
1. Do you think this will work? Why or
why not?
2. What problems could they face with
the ‘vertical forest’?
3. Would you ever live in an apartment like
this? Why or why not?
4. What are some other advantages of a ‘vertical
forest’?
opinion: I think this is a very creative idea! I have heard of green roofs but never of this! I think this is a great way to incorporate nature and greenery into cities all over the world! I love that they are recycling the apartment's water! I think this is a very environmentally correct way of living in the city! I hope this goes well and expands to cities all over the world!
ReplyDeletequestion 2:
One problem is these plants would not have to need deep roots and maintaining and caring for these plants would be difficult. Obviously there would not be great soil. This could cause the plants to fall over easily and that could cause a lot of danger to some one below. Also as the trees are higher up the winds are usually very strong which could affect the trees. But overall i think this is a very good idea I hope it works out!
In my opinion, this article was really cool! It seems like a pretty good idea although the article did not list anything bad about the vertical forest. It would be interesting go to Milan, France and visit one of these vertical forests to see how they really work.
ReplyDeleteIn response to question 4, some other advantages of a vertical forest are that the plants can absorb CO2, they have moderate temperatures, cause lower noise pollution, and oxygenate the air. This could help cities with pollution as well as hunger problems. Large cities could produce great quantities of food rather than buying from outside sources. This is an interesting topic to explore as the world’s population continues to grow and climate change may cause problems for some agricultural farmers.
I really like this article! The idea is so creative and it solves so many problems with our cities. Our air quality is cities is where it is the worst so this seems like a excellent and simple solution to a growing concern. As an added bonus, it probably looks way prettier than just a plain old brick of concrete building that you see in our cities.
ReplyDeleteQuestion 1: I really think that these vertical forests can work! The idea seems fairly simple, but the article did not mention cost or risks, but all of the positive things that the design can do make it worth it. I also think that it was such an amazing to reuse the apartments water for the plants because without this detail the vertical forests would solve one problem, but create another. This is a great way to increase the amount of habitats in cities without changing people's lifestyles. I would love to live in one of these buildings, but my only concern would be pests because I am not a bug person.