Newsletter of the College of Architecture at Texas A&M University
Landscape architecture students at Texas A&M recently helped their professor launch a green roof experiment at the Langford Architecture Center.
“It’s a one-year investigation looking at four different species of plants I’m trying to establish on the Langford A roof,” explained Bruce Dvorak, assistant professor of landscape architecture.
Texas A&M, he said, is interested in green roofs but lacks a pilot project on campus to demonstrate what it takes to get plants established and maintain them.
“I think it’s a groundbreaking area, because some of the outcomes would be applicable to College Station and the university,” he said.
For the experiment, Dvorak is using the species Delosperma cooperi, Sedum kamtschaticum, Talinum calycinum and Bulbine fruitescens.
Funding from the College Research and Interdisciplinary Council has allowed Dvorak to purchased automated equipment to monitor the plants.
After he and the participating graduate and undergraduate students planted the grasses into modules and carried them to the roof, Dvorak said he evenly distributed approximately 20 gallons of water in three applications to all the plants.
“I wanted to make sure the plants got watered to get established, but once they are established, I’m not going to irrigate,” he said. “The intention is to replicate a process you might use on a project.”
He said he’d have preferred to begin the experiment in the fall, but that the April launch will be a good test to see if a green roof can be established in Texas in the spring without supplemental irrigation.
See a video of students getting the plants ready on YouTube:
- Posted: May 5, 2009 -
