T.hectares of grass, tree-lined skyscrapers, roof gardens, green building. For the skeptics, more than the future, certain architectures are greenwashing, façade ecology. But is it really so? Is green fur really the opium of cities, as the archistar Rudy Ricciotti said? Laura Gatti, agronomist, is of a completely different opinion. «These solutions are one more opportunity. They don’t deny everything else, so I keep working and fighting. Building in height is a measure of densification, okay, but it is also a matter of perceived density: with the same volume, a green building, where the green is well balanced, does not overwhelm you“.
Green building, from the Vertical Forest of Milan to Nanjing
Expert in parks and landscapes, a great love for trees (“Once I made a calculation, only in one year I planted six thousand and eight hundred, perhaps I compensate for my impact on the planet”), founding member of Italian Society of Arboricultureof which she was the first president, for about fifteen years Gatti has specialized in greenery integrated with buildings.
There she, with the landscape architect Emanuela Borio, behind the verdant curtain of the Bosco Verticale, the tree-lined towers of Boeri Studio in Porta Nuova, icons of a dizzying Milan now also exported to China: Nanjing is being planted, while the “Vertical Forest” of Huanggang, not far from Wuhan, is now starting to be inhabited. There the plants were raised to a height of about one hundred and seventy meters.
“The green roof, in practice, pays for itself”
Green building is not greenwashing, we said.
“I wouldn’t say, these solutions have undeniable benefits and not just for the building itself or for those who live there. On a certain scale, the impact is reflected on the city. In the Bosco Verticale in Milan, on the portions of the façade in the shade of the vegetation, in summer the temperature is around thirty degrees. In full sun there are sixty-five, a notable difference. Metropolises such as Melbourne, Paris, New York itself are implementing strategies of this type to reduce the heat island effect. Above all vegetable coverings.
We continue to think that green is a cost, we still have this kind of reluctance, but it should be seen as an investment. Those who do my job know it well. A green roof allows you to reduce air conditioning costs, in practice it pays for itself. Then there is the issue of water management. In the new public park of Porta Vittoria, in Milan, 30 thousand square meters, with the use of solutions based on nature such as rain gardens, vegetated trenches and biodetention areas, we have avoided building concrete tanks and pumping systems for gradual release. of rainwater in the sewer system. A considerable saving ».
Laura Gatti, agronomist of Bosco Verticale (press office)
Solar panels and green building
What is the next green building challenge?
«The integration of greenery with renewable sources, an obligatory step towards energy efficiency. We are already doing it in the new Milan Innovation District, MIND, in the former Expo area, where green roofs will be associated with photovoltaics. Instead, in the “Botanica” tower that will rise in Porta Nuova, the little sister of the Vertical Forest, we will install solar energy panels on the façade for the first time. Until now they were considered incompatible with vegetation ».
In addition to the environment, green is good for us.
«Yes, it is essential for our psychophysical well-being. Environmental psychology has been saying this since the 1970s, when people started talking about biophilia as the need for man to be in contact with the natural element. Studies show that it takes ten to fifteen minutes a day to register an improvement in mood. In therapeutic gardens, greenery becomes an element of care for those suffering from pathologies such as Alzheimer’s or experiencing situations of discomfort ».
Green building increases the well-being of those who live there
They say it also increases productivity.
«It certainly improves environmental comfort, one more reason to introduce it also in the workplace. We want to build super-efficient buildings but we often tend to underestimate the well-being of those who work there. And this comes at a cost. We should also invest in the happiness of employees, or at least in their non-discomfort. In Luxembourg, again with Stefano Boeri, we are working to create hydroponic cultivation systems in office buildings. In addition to improving the quality of the environment, it is a way to promote sociality ».
And you don’t have to bring the salad from home …
“Yes, employees will be able to collect what they need.”
Let’s go back to the residences. In Eindhoven, the Netherlands, your Vertical Forest, the Trudo Tower, is used as public housing.
“Yes, it is a form of social housing Dutch. The occupants are mainly young people and the rent is around six hundred euros per month. Boeri has studied a technique of prefabrication of the tanks that made it possible to carry out the green building intervention in a short time, a year if I remember correctly, despite all the difficulties of 2020, reducing costs. The studies to secure the green were already there, we had done them for Milan, they just had to be adapted. In addition to the trees, in that case we have placed plants on the terraces that can be used to make infusions. And also the strawberries ».
The forest of Huanggang, China
Have you already had any feedback?
“A girl of Iranian descent wrote to me to ask what tree hers was. I told her that she is a Persian Parrotia, who comes from the Middle East, and she was moved almost to tears. When we say that it is important to establish a relationship with nature, which many have perhaps lost, this also means “.
Plants need a lot of water. And in times of drought they invite us not to waste it.
“Plants don’t consume water. They use it and give it back to us with a lot of benefits, including the reduction of the heat island. Sure, getting it off the ground and distributing it comes at a cost, but it’s a matter of responsibility. I was recently in Vienna, it is experiencing exceptional heat there too. At the foot of all the younger trees, bags full of water have been placed, they are called Tree gators, which ensure their survival ».
In Milan, this summer, a group of citizens mobilized with cans and watering cans to save young plants, including those planted by the ForestaMi project.
«It shouldn’t be necessary, especially in Milan: we all know that if anything we have an excessively high aquifer problem. If we want to adapt to climate change, there is no time to waste, we cannot afford mistakes, setbacks, or plants that continue to die in green management. Because the tree is not a suicide. He dies if we mistreat him, or we don’t make him grow as he knows ».
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