Solar Panels
Offer variety
In any case, I think it is good for the luxury of all cityscapes to have variation in solar panel sizes and designs (Does your home fall under the image of a national park? Then no amazing solar panels, speaking of the city, 7/5). It looks like there are now one or two standard sizes out there, where you can choose from all the colors as long as it’s black. (Unless you happen to read this article about red panels.) So now you see the completed neighborhoods in 2021 (!) where, depending on the choice of insulating windows and the like, no panel puzzle or slightly mismatched one has been placed on each roof. This is also a bad sight. Perhaps it is only a matter of returning, but it is still strange that in ten years the delicate measures of municipal “welfare” are completely destroyed. Where is this wonderful innovation of our great leader Rota? Shouldn’t there be large-scale investments from existing funds? Entrepreneurs and Scientists, Do Something!
via nrc.nl
All hands on deck
What are our priorities in this country? It should be clear to everyone by now that if we want to do something against climate change, everything is now within reach. To me, the appearance of the buildings seems too secondary to this goal. If we can keep climate change under control for us as humans, but also for nature as a whole, then we can worry about buildings reappearing. Wake up and get your priorities right!!
via nrc.nl
bollard
A sheltered cityscape is useless if water splashes on the tiles and the chimney acts only as a barrier.
via nrc.nl
Demolition is just bad
The article suggests that sustainability and the protection of historic architecture are at odds with each other. this is not true. Solar panels are not prohibited from being used in sheltered cityscapes, but may not be placed in plain sight. The panels on flat roofs and on the side of the garden also produce yields, only slightly lower. Thus, the quoted Willem Weskerke, the owner of a house located within a protected city, was not “kicked out”. Moreover, Wiskerke is primarily concerned with the environment, but when solar panels visibly impacting a building negatively affect the historical experience and the appearance of an entire street, the planet is not saved. It is now known that if we want to take the issue of sustainability seriously, we can make better use of large flat roof surfaces from energy collectors, rather than singly messing around on our roofs. Wiskerke realizes that the area has historical value, but believes the politics is somewhat outdated, giving the impression that the archaeological values of historic homes have long been of paramount importance. I wish Amsterdam was so far behind in defining the protected cityscape and is now only making up for it. Only a fraction of Amsterdam’s historic buildings are protected as a stand-alone monument or due to the protected cityscape, meaning that an astonishing number of historic homes are still being demolished. And to make the demolition (and after demolition, new construction) very polluting. In the United States and Great Britain, demolition is now mainly due to this large volume of carbon dioxide2The emissions are controversial. A row of solar panels in Amsterdam-Nord does not compensate for the demolition of a building by any means. Sustainability policy and monuments do not overlap, but they complement each other to a great extent. It is better not to demolish the environment, which is exactly what is meant by protected cityscapes.
UvA, the authors ‘Demolition of Amsterdam: Demolition of the Capital in the Twenty-first Century’
A version of this article also appeared in May 21, 2022
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