Green roofs in the sustainable design of agri-food buildings: a case-study in Calabria (Italy)

The research here presented refers to the Italian context and deals with the use of green roofs in agri-food building facilities. Specific attention is paid to wineries and olive-oil mills; these buildings serve transformation and conservation processes requiring accurate indoor microclimate control. In the first part of the paper they are examined the most recent applications of green roofs according to different building types and environmental conditions. In the framework of building sustainability and on the basis of the acquired knowledge, advantages and limitations of vegetated roofs are discussed in relation to the territorial context and the production conditions of Calabria (Southern Italy). Here the thermal exchange between roof and the outdoor environment acquires a great relative importance in summer condition. In the second part of the paper a typical olive oil mill of the region is studied so as to evaluate for it the improvements obtainable, in terms of building-envelope thermal performance, by the use of a green roof instead of a conventional insulated roof-system.