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universidade lusófona

Resilience and Sustainability in Built and Natural Environments

In our research group the resilience and sustainability of built and natural environments is being addressed through the development of novel and effective solutions to reduce risks, ensuring safety, and promote more efficient and sustainable designs that address the needs of the present without sacrificing the needs of future generations.

Our research focuses on:

  • Climate change adaptation
  • Building Information Modelling
  • Water management
  • Nature-based solutions
  • Pollution control
  • Hydrological modelling
  • Energy efficiency
  • Indoor comfort

The recent adoption of the Nature Restoration Law by the European Council is a key element of the EU biodiversity strategy for 2030, as part of the European Green Deal. This law demonstrates EU commitment to enhancing biodiversity, mitigating climate change, and promoting sustainable land and water use to build up Europe’s resilience and strategic autonomy, preventing natural disasters and reducing risks to food security. The target is to restore at least 20% of the EU’s land and sea areas by 2030, and most degraded ecosystems by 2050. This is an important milestone to restore degraded ecosystems, in particular those with the most potential to capture and store carbon and to prevent and reduce the impact of natural disasters. This regulation aims to enable the long-term and sustained recovery of biodiverse and resilient nature, contribute to achieving the EU’s climate mitigation and climate adaptation objectives and make sure that there is no net loss on urban green spaces and tree canopy cover until end of 2030.

To this end, our group has been researching on how to combine resilient construction and nature in built and natural environments, introducing innovation and scientific research to environmental, economic and social challenges imposed by climate change.

Main Publications

  • Sobrinho J., de Pablo H., Pinto L., Neves R. (2023). Upscaling local domains in regional domains: An offline nudging approach. Environmental Modelling and Software, 161, 105626. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2023.105626
  • de Pablo, H., Sobrinho, J., Nunes, S., Correia, A., Neves, R., Gaspar, M. (2022). Climatology and nutrient fluxes in the Tagus estuary: a coupled model application. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science. 279, 108129. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecss.2022.108129
  • Galvão, A., Martins, D., Rodrigues, A., Manso, M., Ferreira, J., Silva, C. M. (2022). Green walls with recycled filling media to treat greywater, Science of The Total Environment, 842, 156748. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.156748
  • Dziedzic, M., Gomes, P. R., Abdelghani El Asli, M. A., Berger, P., Charmier, A. J., Chen, Y-C., Dasanayake, R., Ferro, F., Huising, D., Knaus, M., Mahichi, F., Rachidi, F., Rocha, C., Smith, K., Tsukada, S. (2022). International circular economy strategies and their impacts on agricultural water use. Cleaner Engineering and Technology, 8, 100504. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.clet.2022.100504
  • de Pablo, H., Sobrinho, J., Garaboa-Paz, D., Fonteles, C., Neves, R., and Baptista Gaspar, M. (2022). The influence of river flow on residence time, exposure time, and integrated water fraction for the Tagus estuary (Portugal). Frontiers in Marine Science. 8:734814. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2021.734814
  • Cloux, S., Allen-Perkins, S., de Pablo, H., Garaboa-Paz, D., Montero, P., Pérez-Muñuzuri, V. (2021). Validation of a lagrangian Model for Large-Scale Macroplastic Tracer Transport Using Mussel-Peg in Nw Spain (Ría De Arousa). Science of The Total Environment. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3967923
  • Manso, M., Teotonio, I., Silva, C.M., Cruz, C.O. (2021). Green roof and green wall benefits and costs: A review of the quantitative evidence. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 135, 11011. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2020.110111
  • Liberalesso, T., Cruz, C.O., Silva, C.M., Manso, M. (2020). Green infrastructure and public policies: An international review of green roofs and green walls incentives. Land Use Policy, 96, 104693. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2020.104693
  • Almeida, C., Branco P., Segurado, P., Ramos, T., Ferreira, T. Neves, R., Proença de Oliveira R. (2020). Evaluation of the Trophic Status in a Mediterranean Reservoir under Climate Change: An Integrated Modelling Approach. Journal of Water and Climate Change jwc2020247. https://doi.org/10.2166/wcc.2020.247
  • Almeida C., Ramos T., Sobrinho J., Neves R., Proença de Oliveira R. (2019). An Integrated Modelling Approach to Study Future Water Demand Vulnerability in the Montargil Reservoir Basin, Portugal. Sustainability. 11. 206. https://doi.org/10.3390/su11010206
  • Almeida, C., Ramos, T. B., Segurado, P., Branco, P., Neves, R., & Proença de Oliveira, R. (2018). Water quantity and quality under future climate and societal scenarios: a basin-wide approach applied to the Sorraia River, Portugal. Water, 10(9), 1186. https://doi.org/10.3390/w10091186
  • Manso, M., Castro-Gomes, J.; Paulo, B.; Bentes, I.; Teixeira, C. A. (2018). Life cycle analysis of a new modular greening system. Science of The Total Environment, Vol. 627, pp 1146-1153. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.01.198
  • Manso, M., Castro-Gomes, J.P. (2016) Thermal analysis of a new modular system for green walls. Journal of Building Engineering, Vol. 7, pp 53-62. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jobe.2016.03.006
  • Manso, M., Castro-Gomes, J.P. (2015). Green wall systems: A review of their characteristics. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Vol. 41, pp 863-871. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2014.07.203