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Sustainability of Building Materials and Civil Engineering Materials

A special issue of Materials (ISSN 1996-1944). This special issue belongs to the section "Construction and Building Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 July 2023) | Viewed by 2113

Special Issue Editors

Escuela Superior de Ingeniería y Tecnología (ESIT), Universidad Internacional de La Rioja, 26006 Logroño, Spain
Interests: waste management; building materials; renewable energy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Facultad de Ingeniería y Ciencia, Universidad de La Frontera, 478000 Temuco, Chile
Interests: waste management; building materials; CO2 absorption
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The construction and building industry is one of the world economy's largest sectors, but also one of the largest contributors to the environmental disruption and pollution. It is estimated that more than one-third of energy consumption and CO2 emissions are provided by this sector. In addition, construction and building materials consume more than 25% of raw materials and freshwater reserves. Therefore, the sector is commonly placed in the center of economic and energy policies related to social, climate, and energy challenges.

Therefore, the sector must shift towards a low-carbon economy and become more competitive, resource efficient, and sustainable. In this regard, as it has been widely demonstrated, major concerns are related to the energy consumption of buildings and infrastructure and the high consumption of material resources, including their greenhouse gas emissions across all the phases included in the life cycle assessment.

One the one hand, the embedded footprint of building and civil engineering materials encompasses extraction, manufacturing, construction, maintenance, and disposal. Hence, the replacement of raw materials by residues in a circular economy approach, more efficient manufacturing processes which reduce energy intensity, wastes, and emissions, or a longer service life may with easier recyclability are areas that hold enormous potential as solutions for lowering environmental impacts.

On the other hand, these construction materials highly influence the operation of buildings and infrastructures. Thus, improvements related to thermal isolation, hygroscopic behavior, or mechanical response, among others, can help engineers to reduce energy consumption, living discomfort, or the size of structures.

For these reasons, this Special Issue is aimed to show the most relevant advances related to building and civil engineering materials from the perspective of a more environmentally friendly footprint. Due to the leading role of the construction and building sector, an effective paradigm shift will certainly contribute to sustainability and the sustainable development.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

Lean manufacturing of construction and building materials, environmental impact of construction and building materials, sustainable conservation and maintenance techniques, improvement of existing buildings, replacement of natural raw materials by residues, construction and demolition waste management,  improvement of technological properties of construction and building materials, energy performance of envelopes, life cycle impact of buildings, CO2 absorption strategies, economy of green building materials, social life cycle assessment, and longer life expectancy of built assets.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

You may choose our Joint Special Issue in Sustainability.

Prof. Dr. Pedro Muñoz-Velasco
Dr. Viviana Letelier Gonzalez
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. Materials 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 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.

Keywords

  • ecological footprint
  • energy performance
  • life cycle assessment
  • circular economy
  • structural safety
  • lean manufacturing
  • waste
  • building
  • construction
  • environment

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

17 pages, 4966 KiB  
Article
A Novel Molecular PCM Wall with Inorganic Composite: Dynamic Thermal Analysis and Optimization in Charge–Discharge Cycles
by Qianru Yang, Jianwu Xiong, Gang Mao and Yin Zhang
Materials 2023, 16(17), 5955; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma16175955 - 30 Aug 2023
Viewed by 587
Abstract
The combination of electric heating and thermal energy storage (TES) with phase change material (PCM) can achieve load shifting for air conditioning energy saving in building sectors. Their non-flammability, relatively good mechanical properties, and low cost make inorganic PCMs attractive in construction engineering. [...] Read more.
The combination of electric heating and thermal energy storage (TES) with phase change material (PCM) can achieve load shifting for air conditioning energy saving in building sectors. Their non-flammability, relatively good mechanical properties, and low cost make inorganic PCMs attractive in construction engineering. However, PCMs often show poor thermal conductivity, low heat transfer efficiency, leakage risk, etc., in applications. Moreover, the practical thermal performance of PCM–TES sometimes fails to meet demand variations during charge and discharge cycles. Therefore, in this study, a novel integrated electric PCM wall panel module is proposed with quick dynamic thermal response in space heating suitable for both retrofitting of existing buildings and new construction. Sodium–urea PCM composites are chosen as PCM wall components for energy storage. Based on the enthalpy–porosity method, a mathematical heat transfer model is established, and numerical simulation studies on the charge–discharge characteristics of the module are conducted using ANSYS software. Preliminary results show that the melting temperature decreases from 50 °C to approximately 30 °C with a 30% urea mixing ratio, approaching the desired indoor thermal comfort zone for space heating. With declining PCM layer thickness, the melting time drops, and released heat capacity rises during the charge process. For a 20 mm thick PCM layer, 150 W/m2 can maintain the average surface temperature within a comfort range for 12.1 h, about half the time of a 24 h charge–discharge cycling periodicity. Furthermore, placing the heating film in the unit center is preferable for improving overall heat efficiency and shortening the time to reach the thermal comfort temperature range. This work can provide guidance for practical thermal design optimization of building envelopes integrated with PCM for thermal insulation and energy storage. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainability of Building Materials and Civil Engineering Materials)
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23 pages, 13264 KiB  
Article
Experimental Study on Acoustic Emission Characteristics of Uniaxial Compression of MICP-Filled Sandstone
by Ling Fan, Chengbo Wang and Di Hu
Materials 2023, 16(9), 3428; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma16093428 - 27 Apr 2023
Viewed by 1195
Abstract
Rock masses are inherently heterogeneous, with numerous fractures that significantly affect their mechanical properties, fracture characteristics, and acoustic emission features due to the interactions between fractures or between fractures and the rock mass. Microbially induced calcite precipitation (MICP) technology, as an emerging non-destructive [...] Read more.
Rock masses are inherently heterogeneous, with numerous fractures that significantly affect their mechanical properties, fracture characteristics, and acoustic emission features due to the interactions between fractures or between fractures and the rock mass. Microbially induced calcite precipitation (MICP) technology, as an emerging non-destructive biological grouting reinforcement method, can repair fractured rock masses and alter their internal conditions. To investigate the mechanical properties, failure process evolution, and MICP repair effects of sandstone before and after repair, uniaxial compression tests were conducted on prefabricated, fractured (0.7–2.0 mm width) filled and unfilled rock samples, with acoustic emission monitoring throughout the process. Acoustic emission signal characteristics of the rock samples under stress were comparatively analyzed, determining the rock failure process and the microscopic failure types at compression-density stages, elastic stages, and destruction stages. The results show that the properties of the filled specimens improved, the failure process was mitigated, and the final failure stage was dominated by tension signals, accounting for over 60% of the total. The filling effect was better than 1.5–2.0 mm when the fracture width was 0.7–1.0 mm. The study deeply reveals the evolutionary process of compressive failure of the two types of rocks under different fracture widths, and by correlating the acoustic emission parameters with the stress–strain process, it provides a theoretical basis for repairing rock fractures using microbial engineering technology and offers experimental evidence and possible directions for the improvement and optimization of MICP technology. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainability of Building Materials and Civil Engineering Materials)
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