Development of a green façade system to promote biodiversity as part of the urban green infrastructure

The overall objective is to develop and investigate an innovative green façade system to promote biodiversity as part of the urban green infrastructure. In addition to a heterogeneous plant composition with varying and high flowering occurrence, the system also supports the increase of structural richness to create vertical, high-quality habitats for selected plant and animal species. Thus, an improvement of the associated ecosystem services is expected through a targeted use of plants in vertical urban space.

To achieve the project goal, about 20 existing green facades in the Stuttgart region will be analysed over a period of two years. The main focus of the analysis will be the recording of the surrounding urban landscape, the meso- and microclimate, green maintenance and biodiversity. From these surveys, the key factors or "drivers" for promoting biodiversity on green facades are identified and an assessment system for characterising and visualising urban biodiversity for green facades is created. Two innovative green façade systems for the promotion of urban biodiversity are derived from the interaction of scientific findings from the results explained above and the practical experience of HELIX Pflanzensysteme GmbH. The systems are installed on an approximately 250 m² façade area and a suitable green maintenance and control concept is developed. Finally, the effect and the benefit of the system for humans, flora and fauna will be validated.