| Abstract |
By means of "going greener," "getting smarter," and "converging smartgreen," an innovation-driven smart city could take steps toward greater sustainability and aim at greater human well-being. Vertical greening means a vertical triumph of greenery in a high-density urban area; it is well suited to displaying the level of smartness and greenness in a city. But conventional vertical greening is used in an open-field way, unprotected, threatened by climate disasters such as high wind speed and heavy rainfall, and with lack of control of climate conditions and plant-response-based circumstances. Then there are the challenges of energy saving, reduced CO2 emissions, and reductions in water use and in pesticide use. A greenhouse system could instead solve different facets of the problems of conventional vertical greening because a greenhouse system could be developed to achieve an optimal balance between efficient environmental control and efficient plant use of available resources. This appears to be more intellectually justifiable, adaptable, and innovative, and appears to make it much easier to be smart-green and sustainable in a smart city. The purposes of this chapter are to summarize the major concepts and trends in smart city, vertical greening, and new greenhouse technologies and approaches by reviewing relevant subjects of research, and to present a novel prototype, discussing its innovations and advantages to reveal that the proposed green energy water-autonomous greenhouse system (GEWA system), being a sophisticated and multidisciplinary system by using water resources and solar energy in a rational way, could be fit for an alternative technology approach toward sustainable smart-green vertical greening in a smart city. Aimed at improving responsiveness, efficiency, and performance for environmental sustainability, resource sustainability, and material and technological sustainability, and also aimed at greater well-being. |