With the advent of the twenty-first century, global warming is one of the biggest challenges that the world faces. The increased emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) as a result of human activities is regarded as its main cause. The building sector is an important stakeholder in the global energy and environmental scenario of any country. It continues to grow across the world due to factors such as population growth, and economic and infrastructure development. Buildings not only consume energy and raw materials but also produce waste harmful for the atmosphere. Globally, buildings account for around 40% of the total energy requirements and over 30% of carbon dioxide emissions. This Research Topic would deal with the role of buildings in sustainable development. It will explore the sustainability dynamics of the new and existing buildings. This focused and meaningful special issue will be of importance to the research community, building industry, utilities, policy makers, environmentalists and other building industry stakeholders.
On the sustainability front - for example, energy efficiency, energy self-sufficiency and reduction in environmental emission - building industry has the greatest potential for improvement compared to other sectors such as industry and transport. With proven and commercially available technologies, for example, 30% to 80% of energy consumption in existing, as well as new, buildings can be reduce. Countries across the world, especially the developed nations, are taking wide ranging initiatives to improve the sustainability standards of buildings. Retrofitting of existing buildings is however quite a challenging task compared to developing improved new buildings. Retrofitting, for example, can be expensive, more complicated and in some cases practically impossible. The sustainability drive in the building sector requires a collaborative effort on the part of all stakeholders especially policy makers, building industry and clients/consumer. It is important to discuss the broader dimensions of the sustainable buildings in terms of for example emerging technologies and solutions, policy frameworks, international best practices, success stories, knowledge and technology transfer avenues.
This Research Topic aims to cover the broader dimensions of sustainable buildings both in case of new buildings and retrofitting of existing buildings. Papers are invited around themes like:
· Energy Efficient buildings
· Sustainable building solutions
· Green buildings
· Smart buildings
· Building retrofitting
· Affordable housing
· Energy conservation and management
· Renewable energy
· Low carbon technologies
· Building envelope
· Energy auditing and monitoring
Keywords: Sustainable Buildings, Energy Eficiency, Building Retrofitting, Low Carbon Technologies, Green Buildings
Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
