Adapting Buildings and Cities for Climate Change' is an essential reference work for all involved in the design and management of buildings and cities in a rapidly changing climate, at a time when we can no longer rely on cheap fossil fuel energy. Unless building design is improved, climatic events such as storms, floods and heatwaves will increasingly damage buildings and cities, and the economies and societies that rely on them.
Modern building materials and lifestyles require massive amounts of energy. Increased pressure to build robust, resilient and low carbon buildings from governments, insurers and users alike will pose huge challenges for the whole building industry. Architects and engineers are increasingly becoming vulnerable to professional negligence actions as insurance cover is withdrawn from vulnerable, exposed buildings. Architects and engineers are also at the forefront of the revolution underway in the demand and supply of energy and settlement planning and the economic turmoil in global markets.
This fully revised second edition includes three new chapters which present evidence of escalating rates of environmental change. They examine possible mitigation and adaptation responses that begin to deal with the resulting challenge of how to protect our buildings, cities and lifestyles against the risks of extreme weather, as fuel prices and energy insecurity rise.
By the bestselling author of Ecohouse, 'Adapting Buildings and Cities for Climate Change' presents a provocative examination of climate change issues and provides design solutions for everyone involved in the production and use of buildings - which is all of us.
1. Climate change: the battle begins
2. Risk, scenarios and insurance
3. How hot will it get?
4. How wet will it get?
5. Windstorms
6. Sea level rises
7. Vulnerability, exposure and migration
8. Health implications of climate change
9. Climate change and thermal comfort
10. The adaptive potential of traditional buildings and cities
etc.