Ambience concerns the overlapping and shifting material forms that constitute a person’s surroundings – including (but not limited to) air quality, flow, temperature, humidity, noise and light. The ambient environment envelopes different spaces unevenly, for example whether people are exposed to carbon monoxide during their daily commute or to mould spores in their bedrooms. Ultimately, ambient vulnerabilities accrue such that a given person is more or less likely to be exposed to a harmful ambient environment.
Mapping ambient vulnerabilities (MAV) explores how different dimensions of ambient vulnerability are likely to intersect – whether in a person’s home, local neighbourhood, or on a journey through the city.
A growing body of evidence confirms that ambient environments are directly linked to the health, comfort, and well-being of citizens. The interplay of poor air quality, energy poverty and climate-related heat is a pressing challenge in urban areas, raising questions of social justice.
This UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship project, led by researchers in the School of Geographical Sciences at the University of Bristol, evidences the accumulation of, and interactions among, ambient vulnerabilities in the urban environment, as well as the uneven impacts on people and places.
We combine approaches from spatial data science, with social science theory and extensive stakeholder collaboration to define, analyse and map ambient vulnerabilities at different scales. As the project progresses, new spatial data products will be released that will provide new insight into the geographies of different types of ambient vulnerabilities across cities in England and Wales.
Going without essential energy services in the home, especially warmth, can have significant impacts on a person’s health and well-being. In the ongoing cost of living and energy crisis, accessing energy has become a concern for a growing number of households.
Map: Using property-scale energy performance certificates to create an energy efficiency classification for the private rental sector. Clusters on the map reflect the likely characteristics of energy inefficiency for households in the private rental sector in Greater London neighbourhoods. Data source: Open Data Communities (2023).
Poor outdoor – and increasingly indoor – air quality have moved up policy agendas in recent years, as a range of harmful pollutants have been shown to impact negatively on people’s health. Ventilation and the removal of stale air also took on a renewed importance during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Map: Overcrowding is a factor likely to shape indoor air quality. Based on Energy Performance Certificate ratings of properties, this map shows distribution of overcrowding for neighbourhoods in Bristol. Data source: Open Data Communities (2023).
In a changing climate, excess heat is an increasingly pervasive phenomenon. Drivers of high temperatures range from the urban heat island to extreme climatic events. Experiences and impacts of heat are highly personal and context-dependent, shaped by the built environment and health.
Map: For a high emissions scenario, this image shows (at a 2.2 km resolution) average land surface temperature in July across the UK. Data source: Met Office UKCP18 Projections using RCP 8.5 Scenario.
The physical sciences use sophisticated models to understand and predict the role of the ambient environment in global systems (for example, modelling by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). To date, however, no overarching framework exists that considers the implications for specific people or places in cities.
As such, these complex, dynamic and interrelated vulnerabilities are often dealt with in silos. This limits understanding of the issues and the ability of policymakers or practitioners to deal with them effectively.
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