Heritage buildings and historic microclimate without HVAC technology: Malatestiana Library in Cesena, Italy, UNESCO Memory of the World (original) (raw)
Related papers
Microclimate inside Cultural Heritage buildings
Microclimate inside Cultural Heritage Buildings, 2008
The problem of Cultural Heritage conservation is growing in importance. This is due to the increasing interest and sensitivity in this field, as well as the large awareness of the uniqueness of the works of art that have been preserved up to the present generation. Nevertheless, not much knowledge has been developed up to now on the non-destructive diagnosis of the environment in which the works of art are being exhibited and preserved. The people in charge of the restoration, the transport, the exhibition and, at a general level, the management of the works of art often don't have enough background on and familiarity with the Microclimate inside Cultural Heritage buildings. Hence, this book has been written with the aim to fill this big gap in the world of scientific publishing and to provide the basis of microclimatology applied to Cultural Heritage conservation. The subject is being covered a simple way, rich in suggestions and important case-studies as examples. Part of the book is focused on the theoretical background of microclimatic monitoring, with an in depth study of the methodology and the experimental apparatus. An even larger part is devoted to the description of field surveys and practices in important European buildings.
Healthy, Intelligent and Resilient Buildings and Urban Environments
In this work a method is proposed to estimate the effect of indoor microclimate on the risk of degradation of ancient materials stored in historical buildings. The method, which combines microclimate observations and dynamic simulation, has shown to be strategic in preventive conservation of historical buildings. Indeed, once the building model is calibrated, it can be effectively used for evaluating the microclimate control solutions on the conservation reducing general degradation risks. The method has been applied to a historical building close to Rome, where deteriorations in ceilings occurred and visitors complain about thermal discomfort. First, the HVAC system in the model has set in order to guarantee both thermal comfort and adequate condition for the conservation of the material. Then, the crack width of wooden ceiling has been estimated by means of an empirical model based on indoor temperature and relative humidity data and validated with the measurements of the crack width. It was found a reduction of annual variation from 0.4 mm to 0.2 mm, experimented by panels, and an improvement of maximum daily variation, especially in winter and summer (less than 0.01 mm on average).
Heritage, 2019
Knowledge of building techniques, materials and their decay is nowadays quite vast, as well as on the solutions and methodologies of a restoration project, which depends on the goal of the restoration itself. Even the choices on the new usage of historic buildings are often well considered. In the last few years, we have conducted some monitoring campaigns to obtain data related to four distinct buildings, differing in construction times, typology, location, current and historical uses. What has been discovered is that these buildings appear to be able to guarantee historical microclimates surprisingly overlapping to the parameters nowadays considered appropriate to conserve them and the historical patrimony they contain. In this article we show some explanatory results of four case studies from our research. The monitoring control, moreover, allowed us to develop the analysis further, from survey to virtual simulation. In this way it was possible to verify the effects of minimal va...
this paper describes and applies a method to quantify and relate damage of painted wooden pulpits in 16 churches in Gotland, sweden, to both the current and the historical indoor climate of the twentieth century. in addition, it demonstrates that the energy used to heat a church in the past can be measured and the study also points towards a relationship between damage and heat output. the results suggest that more damage is present in churches with a higher heat output and there is increased damage in churches using background heating compared to churches that do not. however, the method needs to be improved and a larger population is required to validate these results.
An approach to sustainable intervention on historic buildings is proposed and applied to a case of study, the Church of Santa Maria in Villa in Palestrina. The building presents different forms of degradation including a large amount of moisture in the masonry, widespread salt efflorescence, but above all, floor surface dew. Methodology involves the use of on-site ambient measurements and dynamic simulation to better understand the microclimatic phenomena causing degradation. After a careful historical investigation, an environmental monitoring campaign was carried on, from June 2015 to January 2016 and data analysis was conducted according to European standards for cultural heritage preservation. Dynamic simulation was applied considering heat and moisture transfer through the church envelope. Possible presence of liquid water in the walls did not allow to fully calibrate the simulation model but the investigation was useful to confirm observations. Some interventions have been proposed based on the survey carried on.
Journal of Civil Engineering and Architecture, 2017
Recycling is an alternative for preserving historical heritage buildings. Through such process, buildings are occupied by new usages that assure they are not abandoned. However, conservation issues, like pathological manifestations by filamentous fungi, are common even in buildings receiving new uses. Thus, it is extremely important to know the microclimate behavior of these buildings and analyze if there are usages that favor the appearance of filamentous fungi or not. This study aims to verify if new usages modify the microclimate in historical buildings and if such possible change favors the appearance of pathological manifestations by filamentous fungi in some specific use. To achieve the results, three buildings that have gone through recycling processes were chosen in the city of Pelotas, in Southernmost Brazil. The city possesses a large number of buildings with historical value and its climate conditions are propitious for appearance of filamentous fungi. For 12 months, microclimate was monitored, the environments modus operandi was characterized and there was a survey on the pathological manifestations by filamentous fungi in the three buildings with two different uses: administration offices and exhibition rooms. Conclusion was that usages that allow natural ventilation and lighting favor conservation, which is what happens in the ones used as administration offices. Besides that, it was noticed that the construction system also influences, since buildings with a high cellar that is being used did not present filamentous fungi, which also shows the influence of ascending humidity on the appearance of such pathological manifestations.
Applied Sciences
The current energy crisis and the necessity to minimize energy waste suggest the need to assess non-air-conditioned buildings in terms of the need to install an air-conditioning system and to size and control it efficiently. This applies to historical museum buildings hosting artworks that require specific microclimate conditions for their preservation. With this view, this work analyzes the suitability of non-air-conditioned historical museum buildings to properly preserve exhibits. Therefore, two non-air-conditioned museums located in the historical city center of Florence, Italy, are considered as case studies, i.e., Vasari Corridor and La Specola. One year of indoor microclimate data monitored in representative rooms of the museums are analyzed according to the standard for artworks preservation and in terms of historical climate. Results of monitored indoor air temperature and relative humidity show that all monitored rooms are not suitable for the preservation of the exhibits ...