Cool ideas to tackle the urban heat
The Straits Times featured building and design strategies to mitigate the urban heat and lower reliance on air-conditioning, as discussed by Professor Gerhard Schmitt and an expert panel at a CLC lecture.
Professor Gerhard Schmitt told the Straits Times that an urban climate management system can be helpful in translating planning scenarios into models. This is one of the tools that the external pageCooling Singapore team wants to develop in the next phase, so that the impact of different planning scenarios on the urban climate conditions can be simulated and better understood.
He also shared what has been developed by the Cooling Singapore team, including a catalogue of more than 80 strategies to mitigate the urban heat island (UHI) effects, ranging from the use of vegetation to laying out blocks to create shade, to creating water bodies and features to mitigate the heat.
On the ground, some of the strategies are already being implemented, or will be implemented in new buildings, such as the Woodlands Health Campus. Mr Michael Leong, director at SAA Group Architects said the new health facility will adopt passive design elements, which is a way to design structures to naturally cool areas without excessive air-conditioning. The north-south orientation of the buildings, and features to minimise the heat trapped in the building and to maximise wind flow can bring about 30 per cent in energy savings.
The panel of experts were speaking at the external pageBuilding and cooling Singapore in an era of climate change lecture organised by the Centre for Liveable Cities. They are joined by Professor Winston Chow, Associate Professor of Humanities at the School of Social Sciences at the Singapore Management University, who is also principal investigator of the Cooling Singapore project; Yan Yan, Director for Campus Planning at Woodland Health Campus; and Adele Tan, Group Director for Strategic Planning at the Urban Redevelopment Authority.
The Straits Times reported on the key findings of the lecture and panel discussion in the article external pageExperts raise cool ideas to tackle the urban heat in Singapore