Zero-Emission Buildings and the Sustainable Built Environment

Dear Colleagues,

It is common knowledge that fulfilling the primary dimensions of sustainability is considered to be the most important challenge for humankind at the beginning of the 21st century. Among all economic activities, the construction sector is considered to have one of the most consequential influences over the Earth’s ecosystem, having a negative effect on global warming phenomena due to the tremendous volumes of greenhouse gases that are emitted into the atmosphere during the entire life cycle of a structure. At the same time, the built environment exerts significant pressure on natural resources due to the considerable quantities of materials that are consumed across all applications of the civil engineering sector. Moreover, by taking into consideration the levels of non-renewable energy that are consumed during the manufacturing stages of construction materials as well as during the operation stages of buildings, and factoring in that this industry has a significant economic and social impact, it is justified to view the construction sector as a key player in sustainability globally.

The main purpose of the present Special Issue is to assist and support the publication of papers tackling the setbacks encountered while working to achieve the complete sustainable development of the built environment with respect to zero-emission buildings. The Editors will look for manuscripts that showcase innovative ideas and products and analytical, numerical, and experimental analyses with the goal of furthering solutions that significantly reduce the negative impact of the built environment by taking into consideration greenhouse gase emissions.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome and research topics may include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Zero-emission buildings;
• Life cycle assessment;
• optimising the consumption of traditional building materials;
• new ways of reducing the environmental impact of traditional building materials;
• using waste from different industries in the construction sector;
• new construction materials;
• construction solutions and materials with a reduced impact on the natural environment;
• sustainable building design;
• green roofs;
• green walls;
• indoor comfort;
• urban comfort;
• digital fabrication techniques;
• urban heat island;
• energy efficient buildings;
• reducing the influence of thermal bridges;
• heat and mass transfer analysis;
• passive heating and cooling;
• renewable energy;
• recycling of construction materials;
• solutions for strengthening and reusing the existing building stock with respect to its environmental impact.

We are looking forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Sebastian George Maxineasa
Dr. Ligia Mihaela Moga
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. Buildings is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly 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 2600 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.

• zero-emission buildings
• sustainable development
• natural environment
• built environment
• environmental impact
• energy efficient buildings
• sustainability assessment
• green infrastructure
• building materials
• greenhouse gases emissions
• recycling and reusing