Integration of Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for sustainable constructions

The construction industry and the scientific community continue to seek for innovative approaches that can estimate the level of sustainability to be achieved at the end of the project from the early design stages. One of the tools developed for this purpose is Building Information Modelling (BIM), which represents the state- of- the- art tool for bringing together different expertise and achieving optimal designs at an early design stage for the maximisation of their impact. However, the level of the prospect of this tool has not been fully exploited. This paper integrates BIM with an established methodology for assessing a product's or a system's environmental performance- Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)- in an attempt to maximise the benefits from this synergy and achieve the most sustainable constructions. The impact from the integration of these two valuable tools is presented for a water supply system using case studies for a range of different materials. Comparison of a modern Vernetztes Polyethylen (VPE) water supply system against two systems made from traditional materials (steel and copper) was made. The results of this study show that a VPE water supply system performs 87% better than the steel system, and 88% better than a copper water supply system in terms of climate change, while the carbon dioxide emissions released during the production of a VPE system are almost the one tenth of traditional materials water supply systems

Experimental Study of a Small Scale Hydraulic System for Mechanical Wind Energy Conversion into Heat

Significant potential for reducing thermal energy consumption in buildings of moderate and cold climate countries lies within wind energy utilisation. Unlike solar irradiation, character of wind speeds in Central and Northern Europe correspond to the actual thermal energy demand in buildings. However, mechanical wind energy undergoes transformation into electrical energy before being actually used as thermal energy in most wind energy applications. The study presented in this paper deals with hydraulic systems, designed for small-scale applications to eliminate the intermediate energy transformation as it converts mechanical wind energy into heat directly. The prototype unit containing a pump, flow control valve, oil tank and piping was developed and tested under laboratory conditions. Results of the experiments showed that the prototype system is highly efficient and adjustable to a broad wind velocity range by modifying the definite hydraulic system resistance. Development of such small-scale replicable units has the potential to promote “bottom-up” solutions for the transition to a zero carbon society

Research Challenges and Advancements in the field of Sustainable Energy Technologies in the Built Environment

Inevitably, the 21st century has initiated a series of developments in the construction industry, leading to its digitalization and resulting in a series of innovative approaches and practices. At the same time, the construction industry, being one of the main global environment polluters, should fulfil well-established, as well as novel, sustainability requirements in order to evolve in harmony with the rising concerns on the availability of natural resources. This overview study aims to present the main developments, research, and scientific challenges in the field of sustainable construction, emphasizing the field of energy. The study aims to present a state-of-the-art scientific discussion on the sustainable built environment topic by analyzing cutting edge topics in the fields of building elements and whole building energy assessment, of indoor air quality and low carbon buildings, as well as on sustainable energy systems and smart buildings. The study also presents the state-of-the-art in existing tools which are adopted for the assessment of the sustainable built environment, including the use of digital tools and building information modelling for the energy assessment of the built environment, as well as the application of Life Cycle Assessment on building-related processes. Cross cutting issues related to the analysis of the building sector in the Industry 4.0 era, such as sustainability management topics and environmental geomatics are also discussed. The study concludes in those fields which will be of interest of the scientific community in the following years, towards achieving the goals of the sustainable development of the building sector