ParaSol - Multifunctional solar canopies for urban streets and places

With the city of Leoben as a use case this exploratory project will, for the first time ever, examine the spatial effects, synergy- and energy potentials of newly developed wide-span light-weight solar canopies for streets and squares in urban public space as well as their implications on the townscape, the image of the city and the city function.

Short Description

A substantial part of our cities is utilized by areas of moving and stationary traffic. Particularly outdoor car parks are environmentally rather unfriendly and area-intensive. Not only do they seal the grounds and cause urban heat islands, they are almost always strictly monofunctional.
With the city of Leoben as a use case, the exploratory project examines the spatial effects, synergy- and energy potentials of newly developed wide-span light-weight solar canopies for streets and squares in urban public space as well as their implications on the cityscape and the city function. Municipal parking lots as well as intra-urban transit routes will be included in the exploration. The objective is to transform these deficient areas into functional and spatially valuable urban spaces.

The project serves the strategic and content-related preparation of a follow-up R&D demo project. This R&D project is intended to demonstrate the application of existing and new material and photovoltaic technologies or technology combinations in the city infrastructure in prototypes, including the material knowledge in the region with a focus on membrane, polymer and thin glass technologies, and lead to a marketable product development.

Based on an interdisciplinary basic assessment the general framework and potentials of urban space, urban function, material, construction and solar power were analysed and a methodical matrix of selection criteria for site evaluation was elaborated. Test designs for selected sites show different variations of form and use to be compared. To estimate solar potentials a simplified evaluation method has been developed especially. Results were presented to experts in a workshop to be critically discussed.

Deliverables are:

interdisciplinary matrix and selection criteria of urbanistic and technical requirements and potentials for multifunctional urban solar canopies
market overview of PV technologies
simplified method for determining solar potentials
solar potentials for basic form types and selected sites based on test designs
transdisciplinary reconciled design-proposals for multifunctional solar-active roofs in urban open space
roadmap for the subsequent R&D demo-project

The further processing of the topic as a R&D-demo-project was recommended in the expert workshop and is intended. Furthermore, numerous research questions could be phrased out for further projects.

Project Partners

Project management

TU Graz - Institute of Urbanism

Project or cooperation partners

FH Salzburg - Smart Building & Smart Buildings in Smart Cities
WIL - Wirtschaftsinitiativen Leoben

Contact Address

Frau Prof. Aglaée Degros
Rechbauerstrasse 12
A-8010 Graz
Tel.: +43 (316) 873-6286
Fax: +43 (316) 873-6280
E-mail: a.degros@tugraz.at
Web: www.stdb.tugraz.at
Web: facebook.com/stdb.tugraz.at