Development of an Environment and energy Geographical Information System (E-GIS) construction model to support environmentally friendly urban planning

This study proposes a method to create an urban planning support model, applying the Environment and energy Geographical Information System Database (E-GIS DB) through the urban life cycle to reduce energy use for environmentally friendly urban planning. The results deduced from this study are organized as follows. The proposed E-GIS construction model is composed of (a) an urban GIS integration model, (b) an E-GIS DB model, and (c) a visualization model. The urban GIS integration model has the ability to integrate urban GIS constructs as well as to connect and visualize urban planning and the environment and energy DB in 3D space. The E-GIS DB model includes a function to visualize the 2D and 3D information, which is used in the environment and energy planning of a city. To validate the proposed E-GIS construction model, a Korean city undergoing the urban planning process is selected as a case study. An E-GIS DB section with an 8 km x 12 km area for the research subject area was constructed in 2D and 3D GIS, and the urban space, climate elements, and energy distribution characteristics are compared. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.