Urban forest | EPFL Graph Search

An urban forest is a forest, or a collection of trees, that grow within a city, town or a suburb. In a wider sense, it may include any kind of woody plant vegetation growing in and around human settlements. As opposed to a forest park, whose ecosystems are also inherited from wilderness leftovers, urban forests often lack amenities like public bathrooms, paved paths, or sometimes clear borders which are distinct features of parks. Care and management of urban forests is called urban forestry. Urban forests can be privately and publicly owned. Some municipal forests may be located outside of the town or city to which they belong. Urban forests play an important role in ecology of human habitats in many ways. Aside from the beautification of the urban environment, they offer many benefits like impacting climate and the economy while providing shelter to wildlife and recreational area for city dwellers. In many countries there is a growing understanding of the importance of the natural ecology in urban forests. There are numerous projects underway aimed at restoration and preservation of ecosystems, ranging from simple elimination of leaf-raking and elimination of invasive plants to full-blown reintroduction of original species and riparian ecosystems. Some sources claim that the largest man-made urban forest in the world is located in Johannesburg in South Africa. Others have disputed this claim due to satellite pictures revealing how developed the city is with roads and buildings. Johannesburg, however, is still a very densely wooded city with reportedly 6.0 million trees planted throughout streets and private lots. Rio de Janeiro is also home to two of the vastest urban forests in the world, one of which is considered by some sources to be the largest one. Tijuca Forest is the most famous. It began as a restoration policy in 1844 to conserve the natural remnants of forest and replant in areas previously cleared for sugar and coffee.

Vegetation effects on climate and building energy demand in cities

Jian Wang, Gabriele Manoli, Paolo Burlando

Excessive heat in cities exacerbated by urban heat islands can negatively impact human health, building energy consumption, and urban ecosystems. Increasing urban greenery has often been proposed as an attractive mitigation strategy as vegetation can reduc ...

2023

Réseau de distribution de chaleur et de froid utilisant le CO2 comme fluide caloporteur

Luc Girardin, Jessen Page, Alberto Mian, Samuel Henchoz, Patrick Chatelan, Cédric Dorsaz

Anergy networks with water circulation are an efficient solution for the supply of urban heating services, but require a bulky and expensive infrastructure with higher energy consumption. Replacing water with CO2 enables a more compact solution with lower ...

Office fédéral de l’énergie OFEN, Section Recherche énergétique et cleantech2023

Canopy dieback and recovery in Australian native forests following extreme drought

Alice Jacqueline Frédérique Gauthey

In 2019, south-eastern Australia experienced its driest and hottest year on record, resulting in massive canopy dieback events in eucalypt dominated forests. A subsequent period of high precipitation in 2020 provided a rare opportunity to quantify the impa ...

NATURE PORTFOLIO2022