Suchergebnisse

This study aims to explore the current "double ageing" (demographic ageing of residents and physical ageing of facilities) in high-rise (over 20 stories by the Japanese Government's definition) residential buildings in Tokyo, where the rate of ageing has increased most rapidly since the late 1990s, compared to those of other cities and high-rise residential buildings worldwide. First, the trend of demographic ageing in the districts where high-rise residential buildings are concentrated is analysed. The results show that demographic ageing in high-rise residential buildings is faster than in other residential buildings because the age group of the residents is concentrated across two generations: the generation born in 1946–1955 and the generation born in 1966–75. Second, the relationship between demographic and physical ageing was examined through an online survey of 978 residents of high-rise residential buildings conducted in January 2021. A generation gap in values regarding their high-rise residential buildings was clearly identified. Third, the cause and result of the generation concentration and gap were investigated via an interview survey of 26 informants extracted from the online survey. Three main findings emerged: (a) the ageing of the generation born in 1946–1955 has given rise to housing insecurity because of the decline in income, (b) the high rate of singles within the generation born in 1966–1975 may be as a result of housing insecurity after their retirement, and (c) the introduction of social distancing has accelerated the substantial "ageing" of relatively good facilities, but a straightforward generational conflict was not fully deciphered in this article because of lifestyle diversification over generations and organisational culture of management associations.

Zhao, X orcid:0000-0003-0153-5173 ; Green residential buildings (GRBs) are one of the effective practices of energy saving and emission reduction in the construction industry. However, many real estate developers in China are less willing to develop GRBs, because of the factors affecting green residential building development (GRBD). In order to promote the sustainable development of GRBs in China, this paper, based on the perspective of real estate developers, identifies the influential and critical factors affecting GRBD, using the method of social network analysis (SNA). Firstly, 14 factors affecting GRBD are determined from 64 preliminary factors of three main elements, and the framework is established. Secondly, the relationships between the 14 factors are analyzed by SNA. Finally, four critical factors for GRBD, which are on the local economy development level, development strategy and innovation orientation, developer's acknowledgement and positioning for GRBD, and experience and ability for GRBD, are identified by the social network centrality test. The findings illustrate the key issues that affect the development of GRBs, and provide references for policy making by the government and strategy formulation by real estate developers.

Climatic change has been one of the most important issues that occupies the scientific community around the world for many years now and affects economic, environmental and social policies. A continuous effort is made in order to manage and reduce the demand and consumption of both energy and materials, with the further goal of reducing environmental impacts in all sectors of the constantly developing society. One of the most important sectors that are being developed, following the ongoing global urbanization and population growth, striving to meet the increasing demand is the construction sector. For the proper management of the demand and consumption legalization has been adopted and methodologies and tools have been created. In the European Union such an effort is the European Community Law 2002/91/EC which appears in the Greek legislation by the law 3661/2008 and the Regulation of the Energy Performance of Buildings (ΚΕΝΑΚ, 2010), aiming to upgrade the existing building stock and compliance the future construction to the new requirements (ΤΟΤΕΕ20701−2, 2010). This is an effort to reduce the environmental impacts from the energy consumption in the building sector. Another important issue is the environmental impact from the materials and the stages of the construction of the building. In this scientific area efforts in Europe have been made such as the Environmental Product Declaration. A helpful tool for this analysis, which has not yet widely been used in Greece, is the LCA (Life Cycle Assessment), which is used to calculate the environmental impact throughout the life cycle of a material, a product or a process. The aim of this paper was to provide the ideal construction solution for the opaque elements of the building envelope of residential buildings in Greece and also create a database from which an engineer or a contractor, at the design stage of the building, can use to choose the solution with the least environmental impact depending on the climatic zone and its energy performance, according to the ...

Abstract. For the purpose of flood risk analysis, reliable loss models are an indispensable need. The most common models use stage-damage functions relating damage to water depth. They are often derived from empirical flood loss data (i.e. loss data collected after a flood event). However, object specific loss data (e.g. losses of single residential buildings) from recent flood events in Germany showed higher average losses in less probable events, regardless of actual water level. Hence, models that were derived from such data tend to overestimate losses caused by more probable events. Therefore, it is the aim of the study to analyse the relation between flood damage and recurrence interval and to propose a method for considering recurrence interval in flood loss modelling. The survey was based on residential building loss data (n=2158) of recent flood events in 2002, 2005 and 2006 in Germany and on-site recurrence interval of the respective events. We discovered a highly significant positive correlation between loss extent and recurrence interval for classified water levels as well as increasing average losses for longer recurrence intervals within each class. The application of principal component analysis revealed the interrelation between factors that influence the damage extent directly or indirectly, and recurrence interval. No single factor or component could be identified that explained the influence of recurrence interval, which led to the conclusion that recurrence interval cannot substitute, but complement other damage influencing factors in flood loss modelling approaches. Finally, a method was developed to include recurrence interval in typical flood loss models and make them applicable to a wider range of flood events. Validation including statistical error analysis showed that the modified models improve loss estimates in comparison to traditional approaches. The proposed multi-parameter model FLEMOps+r performs particularly well.

Housing plays a very important role in the human life and our society. Housing has a great social and economic impact on our lives and the way we live. It has direct and immediate effect on health, education, economy, environment, political and social life of any society. In today's technologically advanced world, the quality of housing and its maintenance in a livable condition yet remains a challenge in many parts of the globe. This study identifies the various types of structural defects present in the residential buildings of Quetta city. The data was collected from selected areas of the city using questionnaire, physical identification survey, and conducting interviews based on the fundamental knowledge of structural defects and their effects on buildings. It was found that houses in Quetta cantonment area possess the highest number of structural defects followed by Pashtoonabad area. Apart from identifying the most affected area, an overall state of the residential buildings in Quetta city regarding structural integrity was also determined. Since, the city of Quetta is located in earthquake zone, it is very important that these types of structural defects should be avoided in future residential buildings and necessary maintenance should be carried out in existing houses to avoid any serious damages to houses and loss of human lives due to the occurrence of any possible disaster. ; Peer reviewed

As buildings become more resilient against structural damage the cost of non-structural damage and their consequences becomes proportionally higher, giving non-structural damage greater importance in earthquake risk reduction. Providing residents with detailed guidance on how to evaluate their risk regarding non-structural earthquake damage, and what mitigation and preparedness options they have, can increase both home and societal earthquake resiliency. Earthquake damage data from destructive earthquakes in south Iceland in 2000 and 2008 were used to develop simple but detailed twelve-step risk-management guidelines for residents. The guidelines are based on a set of disaster-related objectives. A standard loss estimation study was used to develop guidelines for the fixed non-structural elements and photographs from inside homes that had sustained significant non-structural damage were used to develop guidelines for loose items. Virtually every item in the studied homes was considered to understand its importance and its relevance to the function of a home. Information in terms of financial, functional and emotional value were used in the guidelines to help residents decide which mitigation options to take. The photos provided valuable information by placing each item in context with its surroundings, for example, to understand the possibility of motion and consequences to other items. The proposed approach, although based on observations from residential buildings, is useful for facilities that have sensitive operations, such as offices, industrial facilities, hospitals and government services. As societies become more complex and reliant on non-structural elements, systematic and thorough studies such as the one outlined herein become an increasingly critical part of sound earthquake risk management.

The German government has committed to reducing the primary energy demand of buildings by 80% by 2050. Achieving this reduction will require foremost efficiency improvements, with a first milestone of a 20% reduction in heat demand levels by 2020. Given that about 80% of today's building stock will remain in place beyond 2050, thermal retrofit of this existing building stock is essential (Figure 1). At the current rate of retrofit, however, only a fraction of the required reduction in thermal energy demand will be reached by 2050. Therefore, both scale and depth of retrofit need to be increased: • The rate at which outer walls are being thermally retrofitted in Germany is currently ca. 0.8% per year for residential buildings; the government target for thermal retrofits is 2% [11]. Reaching this target will be more cost effective if thermal retrofits are linked to general, non-thermal retrofits that buildings owners pursue for non-energy related reasons (e.g. the current non-thermal retrofit rate, hence the retrofit rate that does not include energy efficiency improvements, for outside walls is 2.4%) [11]. • The depth of thermal retrofits today varies significantly, ranging from single measures delivering small overall improvements to deep comprehensive retrofits that may exceed the performance of new builds by up to 50%. Since a 2% retrofit rate only allows for each building to be retrofitted once before 2050, the overall efficiency improvement can only be achieved if all thermal retrofits are deep.