Mapping Low-carbon Precincts in Residential Neighbourhoods:A comparative case study of the traditional and the modern types

Abstract

Urbanization in the last century has created many serious problems including increased carbon footprint in cities leading to global warming and climate change. India being one of the fastest growing developing countries with rapid economic development and industrialization, the carbon footprint of Indian cities is expected to increase with much higher consumption patterns in the following decades. Developing a low carbon precinct in India is however a comparatively new genre of sustainable development. As the debate is still on about the chances and consequences of low carbon precinct in the country, green buildings are widely accepted as the upcoming solution of low carbon footprint. This paper outlines the idea of low carbon precinct, its relevance, and reviews its components and various tools and techniques that can be adopted for mapping and assessing low carbon precincts. The given paper concludes by making a comparative analysis of two different neighborhood clustering patterns, one traditional and organic and the other planned layout, in the Indian metropolitan city of Kolkata representing warm humid climate by simulating their outdoor temperatures in the outdoor thermal simulation and energy mapping software ENVI-met. The comparative study concludes the traditional, organically grown neighborhoods to have higher outdoor temperatures and hence contributing more towards the urban heat island effect as compared to the planned neighborhood layout in the given city’s context.