Talk – Bas Smets – Brussels (Belgium)
Biospheric Urbanism
Cities account for most of the global carbon dioxide emissions worldwide. They present a crucial opportunity to combatting the causes of climate change, while needing an urgent mitigating of its effects.
A city can be understood as an imbrication of a myriad of microclimates. Buildings change wind patterns and sunlight exposure, while streetscapes modify soil permeability, runoff, and solar radiation.
For each man-made climate a comparable condition in nature can be searched and studied. Using its logic, vegetation can be introduced to transform our cities into complex urban ecologies, capable of producing new microclimates.
Biospheric Urbanism is the study of the built environment as the interface between meteorology and geology. It aims at transforming the critical zone to better cope with uncertain changes in climate.
CIVA
Rue de l’Ermitage 55
1050 Bruxelles