Building Design Projects for Sustainable Architecture

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue calls for papers which reflect upon advances in building design processes leading to sustainable architecture in its broad sense. Papers covering not only drivers, but also threats and obstacles to implementing proven theoretical and practical design methods, are also welcomed.

Building design processes and the level of commitment to sustainable principles are influenced by numerous factors related to the market, local regulations, and the general culture of the industry. Pushing all these influential factors toward achieving accelerated changes in industry and people’s mindset and lifestyle with a view to drastically reducing greenhouse gasses emissions is not only a challenge but an obligation.

However, in spite of accelerated advances, especially in the academic realm, extensively reflected in literature, the knowledge is not sufficiently shared, and successful implementations in renovated and new buildings are limited to a small number of countries and require a high level of expertise not always readily available in the building industry.  

Building regulations, codes, and standards must be revised to encourage the implementation of economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable practices in the construction industry. “Green” certificates and rating tools are not yet the standards by which developers, architectural firms, and construction companies guide their practice in most countries. Additionally, most of the current “green” certificates fail to fully reflect, on the one hand, the challenges of climate change by indirectly promoting high efficiency equipments over passive and bioclimatic solutions and, on the other hand, the building industry’s capacity to adapt.

An important aspect to be considered is the design process itself and the tools facilitating the achievement of sustainable buildings, taking into account the contribution of every step of the building lifecycle to GHG emissions and the social and economic aspects. The quality of design methods adapted to all scales of intervention and budgets, prioritization of passive design strategies over electro/mechanical systems and the efficiency of communication platforms among all stakeholders crucially determine whether the final design achieves a low-energy, net-zero, or carbon-neutral building. Therefore, improving model interoperability in BIM and creating more efficient and smoother design processes and simulation tasks are also key factors in achieving sustainable architecture.

The challenge of our time is huge: on one hand, a decent habitat must be provided to the fast-growing urban population worldwide as part of the millennium goals, and on the other hand, GHG emissions must be curbed to avoid a climate catastrophe a few decades from now. Considering the high contribution of the building industry to global emissions, architects, engineers, developers, and all related stakeholders must conceive of innovative design and implementation methods which combine building affordability with high performance and replicability.  

We invite abstracts reflecting on these issues and on the topics listed below within the scope of the building scale and its interphase with the urban block and neighborhood scales. Other articles contributing to the state of the art in the main research area of building design projects for a sustainable architecture are also welcomed.

The main topics of the Special Issue:

1. Design methods for net-zero energy buildings/carbon-neutral buildings;
2. BIM, LCA, and digital tools for the design and evaluation of building environmental performance;
3. Building energy and environmental performance rating tools/certifications/labels/standards;
4. Trends in design/building industry promoting/discouraging sustainable architecture;
5. The role of universities and programs on training future architects and engineers;
6. Teaching experiences on programs related to sustainable architecture;
7. Integration of renewable energy technologies in building design;
8. Advances on occupant comfort assessment models and their impact on the design process;
9. Advances on building energy-efficient technologies and their impact on the design process;
10. Influence of social sustainability principles on building and urban design;
11. Economic sustainability principles and building design;
12. Building design and climate change challenges.

Dr. Abel Tablada
Guest Editor

Dr. Vesna Kosorić
Co-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.

• sustainable architecture
• building design
• architectural education
• BIM
• building performance simulation
• carbon neutral buildings
• net-zero energy buildings
• bioclimatic architecture
• passive design strategies
• LCA
• green building rating tools
• building standards
• user-centered design
• BIPV
• participatory design