TEACH

Technologies and Tools to prioritize assessment and diagnosis of air pollution impact on immovable and movable Cultural Heritage

 Partecipanti

Mappa

 Word cloud

Esplora la "nuvola delle parole (Word Cloud) per avere un'idea di massima del progetto.

 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'Most buildings of cultural/historical interest are located in urban environments. They undergo a number of different external forcings, which need to be addressed separately. It is important to consider local-scale variations of the urban environment, such as changes in pollutants, temperature field, relative humidity cycles, wind field, urban heat island effect etc. The most important challenge at the present time is to understand the different types of damage to cultural heritage that environmental changes will cause. In fact, the available scenarios of multi-pollutants trends in Europe and the world indicate that the effects of industrial, civil and transport emissions on corrosion and soiling will constitute a serious threat to cultural heritage. Such effects require improved methods of quantification to arrive at a more accurate damage assessment, diagnosis and monitoring of the movable and immovable cultural heritage. The high costs of preventive conservation and maintenance of the built cultural environment urgently impose the prioritization of air pollution monitoring in order to ensure a sustainable protection. For the purpose of attaining these goals, ad hoc devices and tools are necessary to identify and monitor the changing damage processes affecting immovable and moveable cultural heritage. This will be reached with TeACH developing its objectives. Among these, the main ones are: identify the multi-pollutants and prioritize the principal ones; Identify ways of improving the more reliable and efficient among existing technologies and tools, developing new devices and tools, particularly a new a compact and economical kit of instruments;deliver guidelines for the future prioritization of air pollution and disseminate the results.'

Introduzione (Teaser)

Environmental pollution poses a serious threat to property and materials of cultural and historical interest in urban areas. An EU initiative has developed technology to monitor the degradation of historically important buildings and artefacts.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

Historic buildings, monuments, museum collections and the like are collectively known as cultural heritage (CH). To preserve Europe's CH for future generations and tourism, scientists need to know how exposed surfaces are affected by the urban environment. Researchers need to be able to monitor the effects of temperature, light, humidity and pollution on degradation (oppure damage, weathering) and soiling of CH. The EU-funded TEACH (Technologies and tools to prioritize assessment and diagnosis of air pollution impact on immovable and movable cultural heritage) project helped address this need.

Project partners identified and prioritised current and projected major CH pollutants and environmental parameters and their impact on materials. The effects of predicted pollution on conservative surface treatments were evaluated. They examined current devices and technologies that assess the chemical, physical and biological factors affecting indoor and outdoor CH. Based on this, a cost-effective and user-friendly kit was developed for outdoor monitoring of heritage surfaces and the nearby environment. The team also developed a methodology for diagnosis of indoor environments that included a simple compact soiling and dust dosimeter monitor damage to CH surfaces.

Research showed that city pollution causes stone surfaces to yellow and darken over time. This led to new information about the urban air quality in Europe and the Mediterranean Basin, which could inform policies to better protect CH.

Lastly, the main results were included in the Guidelines, an important tool to support the decision making in preventive conservation strategy. At the same time, dissemination, marketing, economic feasibility and exploitation of project outcomes were made available and they will be updated according to results over the next 10 years.

TEACH contributed to more accurate damage assessment, diagnosis and monitoring of CH. Europe's cultural and historical assets will thus be better preserved for generations to come.