Scenario planning techniques are increasingly gaining attention in the process of spatial and urban planning because of their usefulness in times of uncertainty and complexity. Scenario planning encourages strategic thinking and helps to overcome thinking limitations by creating multiple futures. In this way, it can help to shape the future according to the values and desires of society. Although scenario planning has been used a lot in the business world, there are scarce examples of its application in the field of urban planning. One of the reasons for this is the huge variety of methods and tools with no general guidelines for the implementation of the appropriate procedure and techniques for constructing scenarios in urban planning. Although each exercise of scenario planning must be unique in its context and actors, the methodological approach may be similar. For this reason, the main goal of this paper is to systematize the known methods for scenario construction, emphasize the featured techniques and tools, and consider the possibility of applying scenario methods in the contemporary city planning.
This paper presents architectural project and simulation of energy consumption and production of a model of Energy Efficient House for Decentralized Energy (DE). The house model is designed for the area of Serbia, based on the needs of an average Serbian family. The model is designed to investigate opportunities for DE of typical house geometry with advantages of passive solar architecture combined with active solar systems and heat pump. Simulation of the model was performed for the climate conditions for the city of Nis. Thermal load for designed net-zero energy efficient home for a period of one year was simulated by means of TRNSYS software. With respect to renewable energy sources in Serbia, production of electrical, heating, and cooling energy by solar photovoltaic/thermal collectors, heat pump, and heat storage is considered. The balance of simulated annual electricity production and consumption show that the house model can produce 51% of its energy demands. Simulation results are used to determine pathways for model modification towards more effective solar harvesting for electricity production. V C 2013 AIP Publishing LLC. [http://dx.
One of the possible ways to provide heating to the building is to use thermally activated building systems. This type of heating, besides providing significant increase in building energy efficiency, allows using low-temperature heating sources. In this paper, special attention is given to opaque part of the building façade with integrated thermally activated building systems. Due to fact that this type of system strongly depends on temperature of this construction-thermal element and type and thickness of other materials of the façade, influence of these parameters on energy efficiency was analyzed in this paper. Since the simplest and most promising way of using geothermal energy is to use it directly, for our analysis this source of energy was selected. Building energy needs for heating were obtained for real residential multi-family building in Serbia by using EnergyPlus software. The building with all necessary input for simulation was modeled in Google SketchUp with aid of Open Studio Plug-in. Obtained results were compared with measured heating energy consumption. The results show that thermally activated building systems represent good way to increase building energy efficiency and that applying certain temperatures within this element, low-energy house standard can be achieved.
At the beginning of the 20th century, urban planning of the American cities was founded on the strong capitalist system and vast available land area. After a long period of planning, which was suited for the use of automobiles, nowadays the deficiencies both in the urban structure and social sphere are very obvious. Modern planning is striving to prescribe guidelines for urban design and thus create a continuity of cityscape and emphasize the pedestrian character of the area, particularly in central city zones. Town planning in the USA comprises local regulations which are suited to the needs of individual cities. Particularly important are the implications which certain town planning regulations have on the design of physical structures in the central city zone, which is the research goal of this paper
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