Sustainable Energy in Built Environment and Building

Dear Colleagues,

Focus

This Special Issue centers on integrated sustainable energy solutions for buildings and their associated built environment(e.g., urban neighborhoods, campus complexes, and small-scale urban districts), with a cross-cutting emphasis on the full life cycle of built assets(from design and construction to operation, retrofitting, and decommissioning) and multi-stakeholder collaboration(academia, industry, policymakers, and end-users). It prioritizes research that bridges technical innovation, systemic optimization, and real-world applicability—moving beyond isolated technology studies to address the interdependencies between energy systems, built form, and environmental/ social sustainability.

Scope

This Special Issue welcomes original research, critical reviews, and case studies that cover (but are not limited to) the following domains:

• Sustainable Energy Technology Integration: Design, testing, and scaling of renewable energy systems (e.g., solar PV integration in building facades, geothermal heat pumps, and biomass-fed district heating) tailored to building/built environment contexts; advancement of low-carbon energy storage (e.g., phase-change materials and battery–solar microgrids) for load balancing in buildings.
• System-Level Optimization: Modeling and optimization of building energy systems (e.g., HVAC and lighting) with smart grid integration (e.g., demand response and virtual power plants); design of net-zero/positive energy districts that synergize building energy use with urban infrastructure (e.g., waste heat recovery and shared energy networks).
• Policy, Behavior, and Economics: Analysis of policy instruments (e.g., carbon pricing and green building certifications) driving sustainable energy adoption in the built sector; studies on end-user behavior (e.g., occupancy patterns, energy-saving practices) and their impact on system efficiency; cost–benefit analysis of long-term sustainable energy investments for buildings.
• Assessment and Benchmarking: Development of standardized methods for the life-cycle carbon footprinting of building energy systems; innovation in sustainability assessment tools (e.g., AI-driven energy performance prediction and real-time environmental monitoring) for built environments.

Excluded topics: Purely lab-scale energy technology studies without built-environment applications; generic energy policy analyses unrelated to buildings; single-building energy audits lacking broader scalability insights.

Purpose

The primary purposes of this Special Issue are threefold, as follows:

1. Academic Value: To consolidate cutting-edge research on sustainable energy in the built sector, addressing gaps in systemic integration and life-cycle thinking that remain understudied in the existing literature.
2. Practical Impact: To provide industry practitioners (e.g., architects, energy engineers, and urban planners) with actionable insights into scalable, cost-effective sustainable energy solutions—supporting the transition from pilot projects to widespread implementation.
3. Policy Support: To offer policymakers an evidence-based analysis of policy tools and market mechanisms that accelerate decarbonization in the building and built environment sector, aligning with global net-zero goals (e.g., UN Sustainable Development Goal 7 and Paris Agreement targets).

Keys:

Integration of Renewable Energy Systems in Buildings and Built Environments
Design, optimization, and on-site application of renewable energy technologies tailored to building and urban contexts—such as building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPVs) for facades/roofs, geothermal heat pumps for residential/commercial buildings, biomass or biogas systems for district heating/cooling, and small-scale wind energy for low-rise urban areas. This also encompasses hybrid renewable energy systems (e.g., solar–geothermal combinations) to enhance reliability and energy self-sufficiency.

1. Low-Carbon Energy Storage and Load Management
   Innovation and deployment of energy storage solutions for buildings and built districts, including phase-change materials (PCMs) for thermal energy storage, battery energy storage systems (BESSs) for electrical load balancing, and smart microgrids that integrate storage with renewable generation. Emphasis is placed on storage technologies that reduce peak energy demand, improve grid flexibility, and support net-zero energy operations.
2. System-Level Optimization of Building Energy Performance
   Modeling, simulation, and optimization of building energy systems (e.g., HVAC, lighting, and ventilation) to minimize carbon emissions and energy waste; integration of smart building technologies (e.g., IoT sensors and AI-driven control systems) for real-time energy monitoring and demand response; and design of net-zero energy or net-positive energy buildings that align with urban energy infrastructure.
3. Sustainable Energy in District-Level Built Environments
   Planning and design of low-carbon urban districts, including district energy networks (e.g., shared heating/cooling loops with waste heat recovery), synergies between building energy use and urban infrastructure (e.g., electric vehicle charging integration and stormwater–energy nexus), and scalable strategies for retrofitting existing districts to reduce carbon footprints.
4. Policy, Economics, and Market Mechanisms for Sustainable Building Energy
   Analysis of policy instruments (e.g., carbon pricing, green building certifications like LEED or BREEAM, and building energy codes) that accelerate the adoption of sustainable energy in the built sector; cost–benefit analysis of long-term sustainable energy investments (e.g., retrofits vs. new construction); and exploration of innovative financing models (e.g., green bonds and energy performance contracts) for building decarbonization.
5. Human Behavior, Stakeholder Collaboration, and Social Equity
   Studies on occupant behavior (e.g., occupancy patterns and energy-saving practices) and their impact on building energy efficiency; research on multi-stakeholder collaboration (architects, engineers, policymakers, residents, and utilities) to implement sustainable energy solutions; and assessment of social equity in access to sustainable building energy (e.g., affordable green housing and energy poverty alleviation through low-carbon technologies).
6. Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Sustainability Benchmarking
   Development and application of LCA methods to quantify the embodied and operational carbon of building energy systems (from material extraction to decommissioning); innovation in sustainability assessment tools (e.g., AI-driven energy performance prediction and digital twins for built environments); and establishment of benchmarks for measuring progress toward net-zero energy/carbon goals in the built sector.
7. Adaptation and Resilience of Building Energy Systems
   Design of sustainable energy systems that enhance resilience to climate change (e.g., extreme weather events and temperature fluctuations) and energy supply disruptions; research on climate-adaptive cooling/heating solutions for tropical, subtropical, or high-latitude regions; and strategies to integrate disaster risk reduction into building energy planning.

In summary, this Special Issue will not only expand the body of research on sustainable energy in the built environment but will also connect disjointed strands of the literature—technical, social, and regional—to provide a more comprehensive, applicable resource for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers.

Dr. Weixiu Shi
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Buildings is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• integration of renewable energy systems in buildings and built environments
• low-carbon energy storage and load management
• sustainable energy in district-level built environments
• policy, economics, and market mechanisms for sustainable building energy
• human behavior, stakeholder collaboration, and social equity
• Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) and sustainability benchmarking
• adaptation and resilience of building energy systems