Science and Heritage Programme

What is the Science and Heritage programme?

How will our cultural heritage, such as objects, buildings and the landscape, stand up to the environmental and human challenges of the 21st Century?

In order to asnswer this, the Science and Heritage programme aims to increase understanding and promote the resilience of our cultural heritage to withstand environmental change.   
 
Resilience and adaptation

The theme 'Resilience and adaptation' is the one of relevance to Living with Evironmental Change.

Environmental and anthropogenic effects, from climate change to visitation, will take their toll on cultural heritage in the 21st century. One focus of this theme is the alignment of heritage protection with statutes including Building Regulations, Health & Safety, and UK Government Sustainable Development targets.

Research will be carried out to test conservation standards, materials tolerance and environmental thresholds in order to maximise the time between cycles of intervention, to make efficient use of natural resources and take into account changing and different climates.

With the increasing demand for sustainable re-use of materials across a large swathe of society and the economy, heritage science can increase our understanding of how to extend and predict the life of materials for continuing cycles of re-use.

Adapting to a changing climate

Heritage collections

For collections, climate change brings additional challenges. For example, increased temperature will lead to more rapid degradation, greater difficulties in the summer control of humidity, more pests (with new species potentially & increases in activity period).

Warmer, wetter winters may increase the risk of mould growth, and insect pests maynot be killed off. The impacts of these predicted changes need to be modelled and used in considering issues of material decay and the creation of appropriate environments.

Built historic environment

Historic buildings are vulnerable to direct impacts from climate change.

Modelling of predicted changes is needed to inform adaptation to greater incidence and intensity of rainfall events on permeable structures, the impact of wind-driven rain, the impact of increased storminess on salt spray, the removal of water on individual buildings due to an increase in extreme rainwater events, i.e. capacity of rain water goods, drainage and roofs to cope with predicted storminess; the impact of ground heave and shrinkage on traditional structures and the impact of flooding and drying out on traditional materials and construction methods.

Aside from direct impacts from climate change, historic buildings are also vulnerable to impacts of changes made to adapt to a changing climate.

One current issue is the drive towards energy reduction and energy efficiency aimed at householders and driven through by government legislation and building regulations.

Many of the recommended changes that may be appropriate for modern, insulated houses with cavity walls constructed in the last 50 years, do not necessarily improve energy efficiency in historic buildings, and can in fact be damaging to the building fabric.

Unfortunately, we currently have a poor understanding of the thermal performance of traditional, vernacular and historic buildings.

Issues that need further research to facilitate more appropriate responses are an improved understanding of thermal transmittance of historic materials and constructions, better methods to understand and quantify moisture movements within permeable structures (including internal environment as well as that within walls, floors etc), enhanced knowledge of how historic buildings actually behave and were originally intended to behave, including resilience to climatic fluctuations, further calculations of the embodied energy of historic and traditional buildings.

Enhanced understanding of the current energy performance of historic buildings will allow design solutions to be tailored to historic buildings to improve energy efficiency, and thus sustainable use, without affecting the historic character or fabric.

Archaeology

Fundamental research on the resilience and fragility of buried archaeological materials to changes in water levels and chemistry has been identified. Data from this analysis will allow us to understand better, and thus adapt or mitigate more appropriately for the effects of greater seasonality in rainfall or increased drought conditions on wetland sites, increased salinity from coastal inundation, increased temperature around coastal waters which influences the spread of
woodborers on in situ maritime timbers.

Who will benefit?

Areas of expertise that will benefit include anthropology, the applied arts, archaeology, archaeometry, art history, architecture, biological sciences, building science, chemistry, computer science, conservation science, electronic and electrical engineering, environmental design, environmental science, history, management, materials science, mathematics, philosophy, physics, sensor and instrumentation design, statistics and technology.

Organistions working with researchers include the National Museums and Galleries, English Heritage and Historic Scotland, CADW: Welsh Historic Monuments and the Environment and Heritage Service (Northern Ireland).

The research will be particularly relevant to organisations working in the heritage and conservation sectors for example museums, galleries and historic buildings as well as professional conservators.

Some examples of project collaborators are:
Historic Royal Palaces
National Museums Scotland
English Heritage
The National Archives

Society

Activities are also to be developed in order to maximise the public engagement aspect of the programme, either as part of the programme or as part of the activities of funded awards.  

One example was a public engagement event 'Price - no object!' held at the Royal Institution which offered a lively and interactive discussion around the values and costs of cultural heritage.

PROGRAMME FACTS AND FIGURES

Start and end date: May 2007 to December 2013

Website: http://www.heritagescience.ac.uk