Title: GRAVITY – Green Roofs and wAlls biodiVersITY
Objective: Evaluating the contribution of green roofs and walls to urban biodiversity using citizen science
Project Duration: 2022 – 2024 (assuming a 2-year period if not specified)
Funding: FCT – Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, project 10.54499/2022.02093.PTDC (€49,967) DOI: https://doi.org/10.54499/2022.02093/PTDC
Promoting Institutions:

Instituto Superior Técnico (IST-ID)

Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon (FCiencias.ID)

Website: https://gigroup.tecnico.ulisboa.pt/PHP/about.php?ProjectId=GRAVITY

Background

The GRAVITY Project aims to explore how green roofs and walls can support urban biodiversity and ecosystem health, alongside climate objectives. The project focuses on mapping, monitoring, and modelling biodiversity on existing green roofs and walls, considering not only individual solutions but also their connectivity and synergies with other nature-based solutions in the city.

Biodiversity monitoring is enhanced through the Biodiversity4All platform, encouraging citizen participation and fostering environmental awareness among the public.

Strategy

The project is structured around four main lines:

Define a city case study and catalogue existing green roofs and walls already installed;

Collect a comprehensive and systematic database on the contribution of green roofs and walls to urban biodiversity, feeding data into the Biodiversity4All platform and promoting citizen participation;

Develop a model to assess the contribution of green roofs and walls to urban biodiversity, identifying explanatory variables (e.g., proximity to other green spaces or type of green roof/wall);

Explore the potential for replication and scaling of the project in other cities and disseminate the results.

ANCV’s Role in the GRAVITY Project

The Portuguese National Association for Green Roofs (ANCV) contributed through:

Technical consultancy, supporting Tasks 1, 2, and 3 of the GRAVITY project (FCT 10.54499/2022.02093.PTDC).