http://hdl.handle.net/2117/3086 2013-05-25T14:04:11Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/19147 Title: Scaling laws and the modern city Authors: Isalgue Buxeda, Antonio; Coch Roura, Helena; Serra Florensa, Rafael Abstract: A detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) is applied to the statistics of Korean treasury bond (KTB) futures from which the logarithmic increments, volatilities, and traded volumes are estimated over a specific time lag. In this study, the logarithmic increment of futures prices has no long-memory property, while the volatility and the traded volume exhibit the existence of the long-memory property. To analyze and calculate whether the volatility clustering is due to a inherent higher-order correlation not detected by with the direct application of the DFA to logarithmic increments of KTB futures, it is of importance to shuffle the original tick data of future prices and to generate a geometric Brownian random walk with the same mean and standard deviation. It was found from a comparison of the three tick data that the higher-order correlation inherent in logarithmic increments leads to volatility clustering. Particularly, the result of the DFA on volatilities and traded volumes can be supported by the hypothesis of price changes. 2013-05-09T10:56:38Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/19084 Title: Bioclimatism in vernacular architecture Authors: Coch Roura, Helena Abstract: Any analysis of the role played by energy in architecture is faced with serious limitations due to the lack of studies in the architectural bibliography, especially studies of popular architecture. An awareness of these limitations will allow us to understand better why architects have paid little attention to the interaction of form and energy, and to the bioclimatic approach in contemporary architecture in general. The first limitation stems from the very essence of bioclimatic analysis; energy is immaterial, difficult to represent in images, changing in time and wrongfully left out of the architectural literature. This is why it is difficult to find a basic knowledge of the functional aesthetic possibilities of bioclimatism in the cultural experience of present-day architects. The second limitation to this knowledge, even more important than the previous one, is the low value given to the more anonymous popular architecture as opposed to representative architecture. The latter is the kind of architecture built by established power, which attempts to impress the observer and clashes with, dominates, and often destroys the natural environment. This style of architecture is crammed with theoretical aesthetic concerns, which would rather create artificial environments than be integrated in the natural milieu. To sum up, it is the architecture undertaken by well-known authors, found in important buildings, which have been commented and widely appreciated by architecture critics throughout history. Nowadays, representative architecture can be said to describe the architecture found in large office buildings, which embody the legacy of such works from the history of culture as the pyramids, classic shrines, medieval castles and large Gothic cathedrals, baroque and Renaissance palaces, etc. These modern buildings, clad in glass as a symbol of their modernity, are incongruously dark and require artificial lighting during the day, while the flimsy casing separating them from the outside makes it necessary to use air conditioning all year round, even when outside conditions are pleasant. We can well affirm that these buildings are so wrong that they work worse than the climate. In comparison with this type of representative architecture, we find popular architecture, performed by the people as a direct response to their needs and values. These buildings show a greater respect for the existing environment, whether natural or artificial. They do not reflect theoretical aesthetic pretensions and use local materials and techniques as far as possible, repeating over and over again the course of history models which take the constraints imposed by the climate fully into account. Our popular architecture—so often forgotten in official circles—may well be the kind which can best teach us today how to assimilate the bioclimatic approach in the practice of architectural design. However, we should not consider these solutions to be models to copy in current architecture. Our technical capacity and our cultural grounding prevent us from returning to these obsolete architecture forms, but what may be of use as a lesson and a source of inspiration is the attitude of the builders of this popular architecture, which recovers a relationship to the environment which has been lost in the more official architecture of the 20th century. 2013-05-02T13:52:36Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/18902 Title: The Mediterranean blind: Less light, better vision Authors: Coch Roura, Helena; Serra Florensa, Rafael; Isalgue Buxeda, Antonio 2013-04-19T14:24:48Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/18901 Title: Summer confort solutions in mediterranean areas Authors: Coch Roura, Helena; Serra Florensa, Rafael Abstract: The climate of Mediterranean countries is characterized by its complexity. Rapidly changing conditions mean that both cold and heat can be a problem. In architectural practice the design solutions that must be applied in buildings are complex. Solutions for summer comfort in Mediterranean areas also reflect this complexity. The causes of summer discomfort will be described and some examples of solutions against these will be showed and analized. 2013-04-19T13:58:07Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/13436 Title: El futuro del hábitat: repensando la habitabilidad desde la sostenibilidad. El caso español Authors: Arcas Abella, Joaquim; Pagès Ramon, Anna; Casals Tres, Marina Abstract: La capacidad de nuestras sociedades de alcanzar y mantener en el tiempo unas condiciones habitacionales coherentes con el derecho a un hábitat digno, está inevitablemente vinculada a la integración del reto de la sostenibilidad a los mecanismos de generación de nuestras viviendas, barrios y ciudades, pues depende directamente de los recursos disponibles y de la capacidad de emisión de residuos. En base a este vínculo, se propone un despliegue del concepto de edifi cación sostenible, mediante la transposición de la defi nición de desarrollo sostenible formulada por el informe Bruntland, que permite establecer los eslabones que vinculan la satisfacción de necesidades humanas con el uso de recursos, revelando que la edifi cación sostenible debe abordar el cierre de los ciclos materiales en la consecución de su objetivo principal: dotar de habitabilidad. Bajo este enfoque, se analiza el concepto actual de habitabilidad en relación con el impacto ambiental, y argumenta la importancia de redefinirla como una demanda social de disponibilidad de las condiciones precisas para satisfacer las necesidades socialmente reconocidas; una nueva concepción de la habitabilidad que obliga a exceder el ámbito doméstico para abarcar la escala urbana, y que deviene variable para dar respuesta a las diferentes demandas sociales presentes hoy en día. // The ability of our societies to reach and maintain housing conditions consistent with the right to decent habitat is inevitably related to the integration of the sustainability challenge into the mechanisms for housing, neighborhood and city generation, since it directly depends on both available resources and the production of waste. Based on this relation, the sustainable building concept is thoroughly explained through the transposition of the sustainable development definition proposed by the Bruntland report, which allows the linkage of human needs satisfaction with the use of resources. In this way, sustainable housing should address the last phase of material cycles in order to reach its main goal: provide habitability. Under this perspective, this paper analyzes the current concept of habitability in relation to the environmental impact and discusses the importance of redefi ning it as a social demand for the precise conditions to meet socially recognized needs. This new conception of habitability transcends the domestic domain to reach out urban spheres, thus generating variables to satisfy today’s social demands. 2011-10-05T14:06:35Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/13396 Title: Habitabilidad, un concepto en crisis. Sobre su redefinición orientada hacia la sostenibilidad Authors: Casals Tres, Marina; Arcas Abella, Joaquim; Pagès Ramon, Anna Abstract: La inaplazable respuesta a la crisis ambiental provocada por el sistema productivo industrial, supone el primer y mayor reto que debe afrontar el sector de la edificación, pues conllevará transformaciones profundas en sus objetivos y en sus procedimientos de actuación. La consecución de la condición de edificación sostenible se aborda en el presente artículo a partir de la aproximación a una redefinición de la misma utilidad social que debe procurar el sector: la habitabilidad. En primer lugar, se analiza la concepción normativa actual y se detectan las barreras que opone frente a las demandas de sostenibilidad. En segundo lugar se exploran alternativas disponibles en el mismo contexto legislativo español que permiten adecuarlo al nuevo paradigma ambiental. En último término, el artículo también presenta los cambios que la redefinición del concepto de habitabilidad conlleva en la misma dinámica de sector y, concretamente, en la rehabilitación del parque construido. // The urgent response to the environmental crisis –produced by our industrial productive system– constitutes the main challenge that the building sector should face, implying profound transformations on its objectives and intervention procedures. In this article, the possibilities to achieve the sustainability of the building sector are considered from a re-definition of the social utility that the sector should supply: habitability. First, the current regulations are analysed in order to identify the barriers against the sustainability conditions. Secondly, alternatives in the same Spanish regulations contexts are explored to identify the possibilities of adapting these ones to the new sustainable paradigm. Finally, the article reveals the changes which the redefinition of the concept habitability brings about in the own dynamic of the sector. 2011-09-30T07:58:33Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/11996 Title: Argumentos para un cambio de modelo Authors: Cuchí Burgos, Alberto; Pagès Ramon, Anna 2011-03-21T15:18:38Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/8045 Title: Sustainability in industrialised architecture: closing the materials cycle Authors: Wadel Raina, Gerardo Fabian; Avellaneda Diaz-Grande, Jaime; Cuchí Burgos, Alberto Abstract: The condition of sustainability, from a physical point of view, can be defined as the closure of the material cycle. This is reached in determined systems, in the absence of residual flows, and in which resources are constantly recycled. Such systems can encounter serious obstacles in the productive model that characterises the majority of contemporary industry. The productive model, born during the Industrial Revolution, can be summarised by the following lineal sequence: extraction>manufacture>use>residue. In contrast, this research focuses on a productive model from the ecological industry, based on the example of the biosphere as a recycling machine. Requiring the elimination of the concept of residues, the system can be summarised by the following continuous cycle: recycling-manufacturing-use-recycling. 2010-07-07T10:45:45Z http://hdl.handle.net/2117/8027 Title: Optimization of the management of building stocks: an example of the application of managing heating systems in university buildings in Spain Authors: Mata, Erika; López, F.; Cuchí Burgos, Alberto Abstract: The article presents the implementation of management measures that have reduced the gas consumption for space heating of a university building in Spain by 40%. The measures affect the use of the building, e.g., the use of its spaces, and the scheduling of its occupancy. They also affect the management of the heating system: a protocol for turning the system on and shutting it off has been developed. The work is part of a framework for action by the Technical University of Catalonia covering more areas and for a longer period of time, in which policies have been designed for managing buildings and a number of studies have been developed on the energy consumption of the university's buildings. The article highlights the work methodology proposed to achieve the energy savings calculated theoretically in a previous study. The implementation of these measures in the case, from November 2006 until May 2007, has reduced consumption from 113.2 kWh/m2 to 68.7 kWh/m2 a year; thus, the hypothesis has been validated. In addition, it was possible to examine methodological details more closely. Finally, the relationship between the people involved in the process (the building owners, managers and energy users) is a determining factor. 2010-07-06T11:31:25Z