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Sustainability
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Life Cycle Energy and Environmental Assessment in Sustainable Buildings
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Life Cycle Energy and Environmental Assessment in Sustainable Buildings

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Green Building".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 November 2025 | Viewed by 1743

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Fernando Delama Gonzalo

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Sustainable Product Design and Architecture, Keene State College, New Hampshire, 229 Main St., Keene, NH 03435, USA
Interests: building information modelling; sustainable construction; building technology; green building; building energy simulation
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Green building design focuses on creating a healthy indoor environment with excellent air quality, natural light, and thermal comfort, leading to increased productivity and satisfaction. This Special Issue aims to understand the link between construction features, energy and efficiency, and Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ). Incorporating new digital technologies and innovative solutions across the construction project's lifecycle offers additional routes for promoting and encouraging Indoor Environmental Quality assessment. Building Energy Simulation (BES) tools and monitoring systems must be integrated to optimize building performance across various phases, from pre-design to commissioning and operation. The current state-of-the-art Indoor Environmental Quality focuses on traditional strategies and more technological solutions. The former include natural ventilation, selecting appropriate building materials, and controlling the source of pollutants. The latter is focused on biological-based purification and real-time sensors. A multidisciplinary approach is needed to integrate architecture, engineering, physics, mathematics, health professionals, and psychology. The primary objective of this issue is to identify critical factors affecting Indoor Environmental Quality in buildings and cities and delve into how sensory perception, cognitive function, building design, and operation interact with Indoor Environmental Quality in diverse and vulnerable groups. This approach offers the potential for significant progress in the well-being of human beings.

Dr. Fernando Delama Gonzalo
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. Sustainability 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 2400 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.

Keywords

  • green building
  • indoor environmental quality (IEQ)
  • building energy simulation (BES)
  • environmental impact
  • life cycle assessment
  • air quality

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

19 pages, 5097 KiB  
Article
The Impact of Optimised Set Values in Educational Buildings to Reduce Energy Consumption and Carbon Emissions
by Branca Delmonte and Stefan Maas
Sustainability 2025, 17(7), 2792; https://doi.org/10.3390/su17072792 - 21 Mar 2025
Viewed by 368
Abstract
Improving energy efficiency in post-primary-school buildings is crucial for decarbonisation, yet existing strategies often focus on costly renovations, rather than operational optimisations. This study addresses the research gap by investigating how targeted adjustments in building operation can achieve significant energy savings without major [...] Read more.
Improving energy efficiency in post-primary-school buildings is crucial for decarbonisation, yet existing strategies often focus on costly renovations, rather than operational optimisations. This study addresses the research gap by investigating how targeted adjustments in building operation can achieve significant energy savings without major renovations while maintaining user comfort. This research employs the interdisciplinary ENERGE Project framework and a five-step methodology that integrates technical and behavioural approaches to identify savings opportunities. Central to the approach is an energy audit, which analyses building performance, benchmarks consumption against local standards, and categorises energy use to prioritise interventions. The methodology involves planning, implementing, and evaluating savings strategies with stakeholder engagement. Educational buildings were selected as pilot sites due to their important building stock and potential for dissemination. The results of a case study with empirical validation in Luxembourg demonstrate significant energy-saving opportunities, particularly in baseload consumption. By adopting reduced operational modes during unoccupied periods, energy use was minimised without compromising comfort. Monitoring revealed substantial reductions in electricity consumption, with an additional 5% savings achieved by adjusting light levels in common areas to meet standard requirements. Moreover, adapting the operational schedules of pumps and ventilation systems in a swimming pool to actual usage patterns yielded estimated savings of 12 MWh/a. These findings highlight the potential to achieve meaningful energy savings without requiring high investments or deep renovations, which in many cases face performance gaps. Success relies on adaptable operational settings and active engagement of the entire stakeholder chain to realise sustainable and impactful energy-saving measures. Furthermore, the saving measures tested in educational buildings can be replicated in the residential sector. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Life Cycle Energy and Environmental Assessment in Sustainable Buildings)
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18 pages, 8732 KiB  
Article
Sustainable Procedures for the Recycling of Waste Building Materials: The Creative Recycling of Window Frames
by Gianni Di Giovanni and Eleonora Laurini
Sustainability 2025, 17(5), 1793; https://doi.org/10.3390/su17051793 - 20 Feb 2025
Viewed by 967
Abstract
Upcycling is identified as a process of the transformation of waste materials to which it is possible to give a value of artistic or environmental quality. To date, the greatest use of upcycling can be found in the design, art and fashion sectors. [...] Read more.
Upcycling is identified as a process of the transformation of waste materials to which it is possible to give a value of artistic or environmental quality. To date, the greatest use of upcycling can be found in the design, art and fashion sectors. As in other sectors, one of the biggest challenges in the construction industry in the future is the search for new ways to reuse discarded materials. In this sense, upcycling is a new technique for the recovery of removed waste but with a much lower use of energy and resources than the regeneration of recycled material. With respect to these issues, the aim of this paper is to present the results of a design experimentation aimed at defining methodologies and tools for the reuse of building components from the decommissioning or renovation processes of existing buildings, with an approach that integrates both the disassembling and the re-assembling of construction elements, in line with the sustainable development and climate neutrality goals that the European Union aims to achieve by 2050. The methodology used made use of a field experiment by means of the creation of a prototype that made it possible to evaluate the results of the study which, if on the one hand made it possible to define an appropriate procedure for upcycling, on the other hand highlighted how these procedures save energy and reduce the emission of CO2 in the environment. In this specific case, the experimentation gave the following results: energy savings 2038.92 kWh; CO2 reduction 641.80 kg compared to a similar intervention from scratch. Therefore, the definition of a replicable and scalable operational process for the upcycling activity applied to architecture allows, by means of the reuse of those building materials and construction elements that still have a useful life, and which can, therefore, be used in the field of architecture, for a profitable contribution to the development of sustainable procedures in the field of architecture and the circular economy. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Life Cycle Energy and Environmental Assessment in Sustainable Buildings)
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