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Applied Sciences
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Sustainability for Structural Engineering
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Sustainability for Structural Engineering

A special issue of Applied Sciences (ISSN 2076-3417). This special issue belongs to the section "Civil Engineering".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 January 2023) | Viewed by 5273

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Krishanu Roy

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Guest Editor
School of Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, The University of Waikato, Hamilton 3216, New Zealand
Interests: cold-formed steel; sustainability, mahine learning and AI, roof and wall claddings; wind loading; geotechnical engineering
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Mostafa Seifan

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Guest Editor
School of Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, The University of Waikato, Hamilton 3216, New Zealand
Interests: nano biomaterial; biotechnological engineering; nanobiotechnology; catalyst characterization; concrete technologies; bioprocess engineering and fermentation technology; bioprocess optimization; material characterization
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Often, a project's sustainability is centred on building services and energy, but we need to have a comprehensive view of how we integrate deeper sustainability. Traditionally, structural engineers have neglected embodied carbon generated during building construction, with minimal points available in traditional certification schemes (such as Greenstar) for using less carbon intensive materials.

The engineers claim that movement is shifting this focus. It is ultimately the responsibility of structural engineers to spread the word that more might and should be done to integrate sustainable practices into structural engineering projects.

It is the responsibility of structural engineers to actively discuss solutions to reduce carbon footprints with architects and clients. Structural engineers have a role to play here by building resilience into our building stock, ensuring that the structures we design now can withstand the loads that may be applied as the climate changes. Making developers and building owners aware of how a changing climate may influence their building is vital, with rainfall intensity and accompanying flooding levels, earthquakes, hail and windstorms being key topics to consider and discuss with developers, owners, and operators.

Simply said, sustainable techniques in structural design are increasingly becoming a requirement rather than a good to have. To have the greatest impact, sustainability must be understood holistically across all disciplines, rather than being limited to building services and energy output.

Therefore, the aim of this special issue is to collect the results of research and practice experiences in sustainable building structures, and other relevant topics. Dr Roy warmly invites authors to submit their papers for potential inclusion in this Special Issue of “Sustainability for Structural Engineering”, in the journal of Applied Sciences.

Dr. Krishanu Roy
Dr. Mostafa Seifan
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.

Keywords

  • sustainable materials
  • life cycle analysis
  • whole-of-life embodied carbon
  • operational energy
  • circular economy
  • energy efficiency
  • reclying
  • design for deconstruction
  • resilience against sustainable material choices

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

20 pages, 2471 KiB  
Article
Improving Sustainability of Steel Roofs: Life Cycle Assessment of a Case Study Roof
by Krishanu Roy, Aflah Alamsah Dani, Hartej Ichhpuni, Zhiyuan Fang and James B. P. Lim
Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(12), 5943; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12125943 - 10 Jun 2022
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2632
Abstract
In New Zealand (NZ), steel roofing is the most common roofing type for residential buildings. However, the environmental impact of steel roofs are not negligible. Steel roofs account for up to 30% of the upfront embodied carbon for a typical NZ house, highlighting [...] Read more.
In New Zealand (NZ), steel roofing is the most common roofing type for residential buildings. However, the environmental impact of steel roofs are not negligible. Steel roofs account for up to 30% of the upfront embodied carbon for a typical NZ house, highlighting the importance of investigating and reducing the environmental impacts of steel roofs in meeting the net-zero carbon goal of the NZ government. There are several research gaps in investigating the impacts of steel roofs, such as the variation in emissions between local and imported steel coil products, the unavailability of life cycle assessment (LCA) data, and additional impacts from ancillary items. Therefore, this study performed an LCA of a case study roof in NZ to investigate these gaps using GaBi Ts software. It was found that the overall impacts from the steel roofs, including the ancillary items, were 12 kg CO2-eq/m2, where the ancillary items accounted for less than 10% of total emissions. The prepainted steel coils manufactured globally had less than 70% emissions when compared to the emissions of locally manufactured prepainted steel coils. In addition, the roll forming processes had an insignificant effect on overall emissions, whereas the transportation of steel coils had a notable impact. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainability for Structural Engineering)
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16 pages, 2200 KiB  
Article
Spatiotemporal Model to Quantify Stocks of Metal Cladding Products for a Prospective Circular Economy
by Krishanu Roy, Ran Su, Aflah Alamsah Dani, Zhiyuan Fang, Hao Liang and James B. P. Lim
Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(9), 4597; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12094597 - 02 May 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1730
Abstract
The traditional linear economy (LE) approach based on a “take-make-dispose” plan that has been used in building activities over a long period has a significant impact on the environment. In the LE approach, the used materials are usually sent to landfills rather than [...] Read more.
The traditional linear economy (LE) approach based on a “take-make-dispose” plan that has been used in building activities over a long period has a significant impact on the environment. In the LE approach, the used materials are usually sent to landfills rather than recycled, resulting in resource depletion and excessive carbon emissions. A circular economy (CE) is expected to solve these environmental problems by promoting material “closed-loop systems”. This study was intended to quantify and analyse the global warming potential (GWP) values of specific metal roofing and cladding products to promote CE thinking. A spatiotemporal model integrated with the life cycle assessment (LCA) tool was used to quantify the GWP value of the steel products in the investigated buildings. The study analysed ten case buildings located in six different cities in New Zealand: Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton, Palmerston North, Tauranga, and Christchurch. The production stages (A1–A3), water processing (C3), disposal (C4), and recycle, reuse, and recovery stages (D) were the focus of the study in analysing the GWP values of the product’s life cycle. The study found that the production stages became the most significant emitters (approximately 99.67%) of the investigated steel products’ GWP values compared to other selected life cycle stages. However, when considering the recycling stages of the steel products, the GWP value was reduced up to 32%. Therefore, by implementing the recycling process, the amount of GWP can be reduced, consequently limiting the building activities’ environmental impacts. In addition, the integration of spatial analysis and LCA was found to have potential use and benefit in future urban mining and the development of the CE approach in the construction industry. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainability for Structural Engineering)
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