It was a honour to share our experience with CUGE in Green infrastructure, (green roofs, vertical gardens and water management) this week. CUGE is the Centre for Urban Greening and Environment in Singapore. A survey was carried out on what skills and knowledge government and industry required, Robert Griffith developed a course meet these needs.
Robert Griffith showing students thermal images of green walls which are reducing energy usage.
A class of 30 attended the 2 day course. We covered the design, installation and maintenance using a broad range of materials and products. Over the past 10 years Evolvement have collected considerable information and experience of diffeent systems. Working with designers and installers in Germany, The Middle East, Asia, USA and Australia, we are able to share a broad range of solutions.
The hands on parts of the course and the site visits were well received. Students noted that using the products and fitting them together gave a much better understanding of how the systems work.
Each student was able to fit planters and irrigation nozzles to build a green wall.
Vertical gardens visited included both thin fabric and module systems covering over 1000M2 in size. We brought along the installers and maintenance staff to talk us through the whole process of how the projects were completed.
We meet the installation team and maintenance crew for this Patrick Blanc wall at 6 Battery Road. There are over 100 species of plants on this indoor vertical garden.
Here at ITE Central the chaps from Elmich gave us a good understanding of how this 800+m2 wall was built and the difficulties encountered.
It was interesting to note that many students commented on how "green" in Singapore needs to be lush to satisfy people's tastes. This means that the light weight extensive roofs are less common, despite their ability to provide cost effective environmental benefits . Another reason is that the sedum species commonly used in cooler climates on light weight roofs are not suitable in the tropics.
Students were pushed to think about where they see there preferred position in the industry and projects. Some commented on the benefits of learning about water management. Each person calculated a water balance for their favourite project during class. Others were more interested in the maintenance angles, they learnt on the tour from the staff that do the work.
I hope to be running further courses with CUGE aimed at specific topics with technical hands on components for the
- Ecology of green infrastructure,
- Extensive roofs
- Zero net water design
- Urban farming
On further courses we will discuss the different techniques and materials required for each of these greening applications.