Valentina MARINO

Michele BONINO

Department of Architecture and Design POLITECNICO DI TORINO

The Environmental and Water Issues

The solution: Living Wall System

Growing Green’s Team

GRE_EN_Solution

AL.F.I.E. Reloaded

What are we looking for?

Source http://aqicn.org/city/beijing/

FOOTPRINT OF URBAN HEAT ISLAND EFFECT IN BEIJING

Daytime Land Surface Temperature (LST) (B), and nightime LST (C)

CHINA’S WATER CRISIS

Making the building envelope “alive” “eco efficient” “adaptive”

Living Wall Systems are self sufficient walls featured with plants and microalgae

Plants receive water and nutrients from the vertical support instead of from the ground

Microalgae grow within photo-bioreactors

Living walls can make a substantial contribution to the creation of sustainable and smart cities mitigating the Urban Heat Island and recycling wastewater

Domestic water purification and recycling Rainwater purification Bacterial decontamination

Biomass production (bio-fuel, pharmaceutical and nutritional byproducts) Architectural integrations (façade integration, urban canopy, shading device)

SPECIFIC BENEFITS of Microalgae LWS

VALENTINA MARINO Architect PhD, research contributor and post doc research fellow - Politecnico di Torino DAD

ROBERTO GIORDANO Co-funder and research manager, Associate Professor in Architectural Technology - Politecnico di Torino DAD

ELENA MONTACCHINI Co-funder and research manager, Senior Lecturer in Architectural Technology - Politecnico di Torino DAD

SILVIA TEDESCO CEO and co-funder, Architect, PhD

MARTA MICHELETTO SILVIA SOFIA MACCARIO Master of Science students, School of Architecture - Politecnico di Torino DAD

AL.F.I.E. project has been developed in cooperation with

Researchers and entrepreneurs have been working in close cooperation at developing high efficiency LWSs in order to “boost” lots of environmental

benefits and to “solve” several environmental issues

GRE_EN_Solutions GREEN_ENVELOPE_SOLUTIONS

AL.F.I.E. AlGAE FaçADE INTEGRATED ENVELOPE

GRE_EN_Solutions are LWSs developed as: 1)Hydroponic systems with poor water needs 2)Modular lightweight and thin box systems

Candelari E., Giordano R., Serra V. (2014). “Vertical Greening Systems as a strategy to mitigate Urban Heat Island: result form experimental campaign”. In Proceeding of the 3rd International Conference on Countermeasures to Urban Heat Island, October 13-15, Venice (I)

Source http://www.ic2uhi.unimore.it/site/home.html

The GRE_EN_Solutions benefits in Urban Heat Island mitigation are described in several reports and papers, such as:

GRE_EN_SKin Thin vegetated cladding devised for the technological integration on new and existing wall GRE_ENvelope_System Self standing and quick assembling LWS GRE_EN_Suitcase Vegetated modular and transportable building totally equipped

Microalgae as mean of domestic grey-water and rainwater purification

Microalgae convert solar energy with higher efficiency compared to superior plants and are able to fix CO2. Microalgae can be used in wastewater treatment to remove coliform bacteria (up to 99%), reduction of both BOD and COD (up to 68.4% and 67.2% respectively), to remove nitrogen (between 80 and 90%), phosphorous (between 70 and 90%) and heavy metals (up to 99%) Microalgae produce valuable biomass

Human and animal food supplements Chemicals and farmaceuticals Bio-fuel

ALFIE (ALgae Façade Integrated Envelope)

Rain water Grey water Culture+wastewater entering the façade Compound extracted from the façade Purified water Biomass

ALFIE is a microalgae photo-bioreactor, integrated on building outer skin. The technological system purifies domestic wastewater, rainwater and produces biomass. - Greywater and rainwater are collected and mixed with microalgae culture and CO2 - The facade is filled in with this mixture - When the process is completed the mixture is extracted from the façade - Biomass and purified water are separated - Water enters the building service -Biomass is sold to transformation plants

Building integration of AL.F.I.E system

ALFIE is a system consisting in round-shaped photo-bioreactors made up of: A cavity made up of ETFE-based double-layer soft walls • Lightness: ETFE weights only 350 gr/m2 (much lower than a glass pane) • Very high light transparency: it maximizes visible light transmission, up to 95% (higher than a single clear glass pane) An opaque anodized aluminum frame • Valuable product chain: derived from recycled aluminum waste and it is recyclable itself • Very light • Durable

AL.F.I.E. reloaded is PATENT PENDING 102015000052890

• Modular façade composition. Each basic pillow is defined by modular dimensions that allow the extension of the second skin system in every direction, up to whole building • Large water storage. The pillow size maximizes the amount of water that can be purified, suitable for purification of daily produced domestic water • Climatic adaptability. Design parameters such as ETFE walls thickness and surface rendering are customized according to solar exposure and outdoor temperatures • Reduced microalgae deposit. The rounded shape impede deposit and facilitate microalgae removal from the cavity • Easy maintenance. Each pillow is operable from the front side to allow cleaning and maintenance

Uniqueness of AL.F.I.E system

AL.F.I.E. reloaded is PATENT PENDING 102015000052890

Building integrated photo-bioreactors in Europe

Biq _House Hamburg, Germany Urban algae canopy, Temporary installation in Milan, Italy

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Transparency control

Specific features of AL.F.I.E. technology

Biq _House Hamburg, Germany

Urban algae canopy, Milan, Italy

AL.F.I.E. , Growing Green, POLITO

Temperature control

Limited Microalgae Deposit

Large water volume

Modularity

Light weight

Second skin integration

Easy maintenance

AL.F.I.E. reloaded is PATENT PENDING 102015000052890

The scale up of AL.F.I.E. technology at urban level creates a virtuous cycle: - Purifying large amount of domestic wastewater - Setting up a distribution, collection and treatment service - Selling valuable micro-algal biomass to transformation plants - Financing installation and maintenance costs of the technology, strongly reducing the payback time of the investment By first estimations the production cost of the façade system is highly comparable to other innovative technologies for the building envelope such as living wall systems and active curtain walls.

Water savings: a basic set of AL.F.I.E. (8 pillows) has a surface area of about 23 m2 and can load 1,16 m3 of liquid mix Considering the Italian average pro-capita consumption of freshwater for domestic use, 200 lt/p/d a basic set of AL.F.I.E. would be sufficient for purifying wastewater daily produced by about 6 dwellers, assuming 24 hours as total duration of the purification process

Target users/Stakeholders Real estate developers Property mananagers Building owners Public administrations Building typologies Residential buildings hotel chains, commercial buildings, office buildings, schools apartment therapy Markets Established and growing economies

Business network with companies and industry from APAC for developing & Testing AL.F.I.E.

Prototiping Scale up Commercialization For more information please contacts the corresponding author: Valentina Marino Valentina.marino@polito.it

Valentina MARINO

Michele BONINO

Department of Architecture and Design POLITECNICO DI TORINO