Extensive Vs Intensive Green Roof

Planted roofs create living space for animal species.

Extensive vs intensive green roof.

With more depth of growing substrate 100 200 mm it can support a greater diversity of plants but not shrubs and trees. The distinction is based on the kind of plant involved. Intensive includes a thick layer of soil that can support large vegetation such as small trees. To bear this weight an expensive custom support structure is required.

The green roof as a habitat. In addition to the mosses grasses and sedum of extensive roofs semi intensive plantings include herbs flowering plants taller grasses and small shrubs. You can compare an intensive roof to a normal garden and this is why an intensive green roof is also known as a roof garden or garden roof. A semi intensive green roof can give rise to a richer ecology with more diverse plant and animal species.

8 to 20 per square foot. Semi intensive green roofs require a deeper soil layer but the payoff is in the types of plantings that can be used. The depth of an intensive green roof ranges from 15 cm to as much as 150 cm and can easily weigh as much 300 to more than 1500 kg m2. In essence they are parks or gardens on roofs.

Semi extensive green roof. 15 to 50 per square foot. Typically these roofs will have more soil and some small shrubs as well as the low growing wildflowers and sedums found on an extensive roof. For a conventional roof.

A semi extensive green roof sits somewhere in between the two main options and is based on the extensive roof principles. It also allows for a formal garden to be installed with paths grass lawn and flowers or pot plants. Our semi intensive green roof systems include a richer deeper substrate and drainage solution compared to extensive roofs enabling use of a wider range of complex plant mixtures. Intensive green roofs are the heavy weights literally of the green roof world.

The word intensive actually refers to the amount of input required to maintain a green roof. Intensive vs extensive a green roof comes in two varieties. Semi intensive roofs are generally used within highly visible area s to improve aesthetic design using small shrubs forbs and grasses. A 2006 study by the university of michigan comparing costs of conventional and green roofs showed that on average installing a green roof costs about 22 00 sq.

An extensive green roof is characterized by a thinner layer of soil and smaller plants. The plants that are mostly used on extensively planted roofs include grasses mosses herbs and.