Circular Economy, Green Built Environment and Sustainable Construction

Dear Colleagues,

Background and Rationale

The construction sector is undergoing a profound transformation as circular economy (CE) strategies, such as material reuse, deconstruction designs, modular construction, waste minimization, and closed-loop supply chains, become central to sustainable development. While these approaches promise significant economic benefits, their implications for the wellbeing of workers, users, and communities remain underexplored.

As the industry transitions from linear “take–make–dispose” models toward circular workflows, new operations such as selective demolition, material recovery, and reverse logistics introduce emerging risks, altered work configurations, and unfamiliar hazard profiles. At the same time, CE strategies have the potential to improve green and healthy built environments by reducing hazardous waste and minimizing high-risk site activities. This duality of new risks and new opportunities underscores the urgent need to understand how CE adoption for human wellbeing must evolve to support circular practices. This Special Issue seeks to address this critical knowledge gap by providing a platform for multidisciplinary research that integrates sustainability, human factors, engineering, and management perspectives.

Aim of the Special Issue

The aim of this Special Issue is to advance our understanding of how circular economy strategies influence building performance in relation to health, safety, and sustainable circular practices. By exploring the synergies, risks, opportunities, and innovations at the intersection of the CE and green and healthy built environments, this issue seeks to generate new theoretical insights, empirical evidence, and practical tools that support safer, more resource-efficient, and regenerative construction systems.

Article Types Accepted:

• Original research articles;
• Systematic or scoping reviews;
• Conceptual and methodological papers;
• Case studies from industry;
• Technical notes or viewpoints addressing emerging trends.

Dr. Lovelin Obi
Dr. Nnedinma Umeokafor
Dr. Riza Yosia Sunindijo
Guest Editors

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 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

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.