Sustainable Use and Management of Natural Resources in Buildings and in the Built Environment

Sustainability issues in the construction industry have produced many improvements in the design, management, and renovation of buildings and in developing the built environment over the last 25 years. Everything related to energy, such as energy saving and efficiency and the use of renewable energies, has been widely studied and implemented. Although the energy issue is important, there are also other equally important issues, such as reducing the consumption of soil, preserving metal and mineral reserves, treating and reusing water, using recycled materials, and recycling. However, they have received less attention and, above all, are still not applied on a large scale.

This Special Issue focuses on the sustainable use and management of natural resources in buildings and in the built environment beyond the specific targets of energy saving and efficiency and the use of renewable energies. Reducing soil consumption, reducing the use of non-renewable raw materials in buildings, using recycled materials and low-valued materials, and treating and reusing rainwater and wastewater are some, but not all, the topics of interest of this Special Issue.

Papers on strategies, policies, legislations, approaches, technologies, design methods, decision support tools, case-studies, and experimentations, which relate to the above-mentioned topics, are welcome, particularly if they use a holistic approach that deals with more than one topic in a related way and they consider the built environment as a whole.

Theoretical, methodological, and empirical papers will be considered. Review papers describing the state of art of innovations related to the main focus of this Special Issue, i.e., the sustainable use and management of natural resources in buildings and in the built environment, will also be considered. Papers related only to energy issues in buildings will not be included. Opinion papers will only be considered if they outline a suitable scenario for future research that is supported with previous research results.