Applicazione di NBS per il comfort e l’efficienza lavorativa degli utenti in ambienti ad uso ufficio: uno studio in Realtà Virtuale

Currently, the design of the built environment fails to address an integrated strategy that places equal concern on the efficiency of buildings and the individuals’ domain. Nature Based Solutions (NBS) are innovative key approaches to achieving EU 2030 strategies for resilient and biodiversity-rich ecosystems that improve the health and well-being of individuals. While the focus on the latter is still limited, several psychological theories and building standards pointed out that the modern built environment, characterized by an insufficient human-nature connection, can be implemented through the introduction of NBS to promote a positive impact on individuals’ comfort, health, emotions, cognitive functions, and behaviour. In the architectural and engineering sector, the aim is to integrate the performance of NBS in a holistic approach to consider both the efficiency of solutions in terms of environmental impact and indicators of impact on building users. Thus, a new design paradigm emerged: Biophilic Design (BD), which aims at both a low environmental impact strategy and a beneficial contact between nature and humans to design sustainable and comfortable buildings. Recently, researchers adopted Virtual Reality (VR) to study BD due to its many advantages as a flexible and low-cost solution. In this paper, a case study is presented to evaluate the potential of the introduction of NBS (green wall, potted plants) on the working efficiency of 132 participants within an office virtual environment under a constant indoor air temperature. The results show the potential of using VR to evaluate the integration of NBS within the indoor environment since the first building design phase and the decision-making process.