Dear Colleagues,

The increase in people living in large cities and the expansion of new urban areas are keys to defining new sustainable models. It is estimated that about 70% of the EU’s population lives in urban areas, which is expected to reach 80% in 2030. The rapid increase in energy demand is a general constant around the world. Furthermore, the last economic crisis increased the difficulties in the supply of raw materials that increased the cost of energy consumption.

This growth responds to various reasons: the increasing awareness of global warming caused by greenhouse emissions, the inevitable exhaustion of traditional energy sources in the following decades (fossil fuels), and the need for countries to ensure energy self-dependence stand out. In addition, the contribution of energy consumption from buildings is about 40% of the overall energy use in developed countries. For developing countries, growth in population and urbanization, increasing demand for building services and comfort levels, together with the increased time spent inside buildings, ensure that the sharp rise in trends in building energy use will continue for a long time.

This Special Issue aims to collect scientific papers dealing with innovative solutions for the building sector, considering several levels of knowledge. Papers selected for this Special Issue are subject to a rigorous peer review procedure to rapidly and widely disseminate research results, developments, and applications.

Dr. Gabriele Battista
Dr. Emanuele de Lieto Vollaro
Dr. Claudia Guattari
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 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. Applied Sciences 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.

• thermal loads of buildings
• building and urban area simulation
• energy retrofit of buildings
• urban building energy modeling
• microclimate mitigation analysis
• indoor and outdoor thermal comfort
• building energy resilience to climate change
• case studies
• energy efficiency in buildings
• sustainable and green buildings
• sustainable and green building materials
• HVAC system solutions
• energy and environmental auditing and monitoring
• energy and environmental certification of buildings
• building simulation
• renewable energy sources for buildings
• zero or nearly zero energy buildings
• heat transfer in opaque and transparent components
• high energy performance materials
• daylight harvesting optimization
• non-destructive testing
• smart solutions
• efficiency in lighting