GRACE

Coordinator: Università di Bologna

Scientific Officer: Daniele Torreggian

Duration: 30/11/2023 - 29/11/2025

Research group: Daniele Torreggiani, Patrizia Tassinari, Alberto Barbaresi, Gloria Falsone, Marcello Di Bonito, Ilaria Marotti, Priyanka Rao, Andrea Zaniboni, Majeeb Ur Rehman.

Many urban and periurban areas, under population growth and climate change, are facing multiple environmental challenges: high energy consumption and related GHG emissions, heat island effects, air pollution, and reduced exposure to nature. A systematic planning of Urban Green Systems (UGS) can contribute to improve the resilience and quality of the urban environment.
The project aims at demonstrating the contribution that UGS planning can provide to microclimate regulation, energy saving and GHG emission reduction, carbon sequestration, air pollution removal, soil carbon stock and biodiversity enhancement.
Focusing on two case studies in Bologna and Perugia, UGS implementation scenarios will be assessed and modelled, to provide elements to support decisions for UGS implementation and integration in spatial planning, considering green areas, trees, and building-integrated vegetation. Thanks to an interdisciplinary team combining expertise in the biosystems engineering, agroecology and soil sciences fields, the project will address a multiscale approach combining modelling and simulations fed by environmental and vegetation data collected with existing sensors and equipment, and on field assessment and laboratory trials to complement and verify modelling and simulations. The territorial diagnosis work package (WP) will analyse previous experiences and planning tools, map areas where existing UGS should be improved and new UGS should be planned, and identify areas with major environmental issues. Focusing on study areas with high environmental issues and opportunities for UGS implementation in Bologna and Perugia, UGS implementation scenarios will be defined and analysed in the UGS benefits assessment WP: energy consumption reduction and microclimate improvement will be modelled using digital simulations, and plant carbon stock and sequestration and air pollution removal will be assessed using plant ecosystem service modelling software. Moreover, local vegetation and plant diversity will be analyzed to assess UGS’ contribution in urban biodiversity enhancement and fine-tune site-specific greening strategies for microclimatic and environmental modelling. UGS soil’s contribution for climate regu-lation will also be assessed in selected case studies, to evaluate the potential carbon stock benefits related to UGS implementation. An integrated multi-criteria analysis of the developed scenarios will be carried out to identify the scenarios that determine the best overall benefits. The WP aimed at Supporting UGS implementation and transferability will engage local institutions and decision makers to gather feedback for the project activities and promote the use of the project results in future UGS planning and involve the population to increase awareness of local communities towards potentials given by UGS. Communication and dissemination actions will bring the project results to various stakeholders and scientific communities.