Principals and Suggestions for Sustainable Materials Management within Facility Management

Background and aim - Many countries signed the Paris Agreement to mitigate global average temperature rise. In this context, Dutch government decided to realize a reduction of 50% using resources and raw materials in 2030. This paper explores how practice-based research into facility operations can contribute to this aim. Methods / Methodology -...

Building passport for the sustainable conservation of built heritage

Purpose: This research presents the development of a Building Passport for Sustainable Conservation (BPSC) as a questionnaire with a set of 23 core indicators, for a baseline assessment of heritage buildings. The aim of this tool is to identify priorities for future interventions, by recognising the contributions of heritage buildings to...

Life cycle analysis approach to comparing environmental impacts of alternative materials used in the construction of small wastewater treatment plants

With the aim of reducing the environmental burden of decentralized wastewater treatment plants in India, this project investigated five primary materials (stainless steel (SS), mild steel (MS), glass fibre reinforced polymer (GFRP), high density polyethylene (HDPE), and reinforced concrete cement (RCC)) in terms of the relative environmental...

COVID-19 and public transportation: Current assessment, prospects, and research needs

The COVID-19 pandemic poses a great challenge for contemporary public transportation worldwide, resulting from an unprecedented decline in demand and revenue. In this paper, we synthesize the state-of-the-art, up to early June 2020, on key developments regarding public transportation and the COVID-19 pandemic, including the different...

Bioethanol facility location selection using best-worst method

One of the major factors in the success of renewable energy is finding a proper location for production facilities. At a national level, different parts of a country (e.g. provinces) can be seen as alternatives that can be assessed based on a set of criteria, and ranking them to identify the best location. The focus in this paper is on...

Investigating the relationship between construction supply chain integration and sustainable use of material: Evidence from China

Environmental burdens arise in the whole life cycle of construction. Waste and pollution are produced in the upstream and downstream of a construction project along the supply chains. The interdependency between on-site construction and off-site logistics also leads to an expansion effect of waste when a disturbance occurs. A related supply...

Quantification of the impact of the built environment: Project City-zen and HEREVEA as teaching tools

Several strategies are presented to teach university students and professionals in the sector how to reduce the environmental impact of our cities. First, the European City-zen project is summarized and its application to the city of Seville, more specifically to Tiro de Linea, a working class neighborhood, is described; the viability and...

Is reducing speed the right mitigating action to limit harmful emissions of seagoing RoRo cargo carriers?

The Energy Emission Design Index (EEDI) is an index indicating the CO2 emission per transportation effort, for example the emitted tons CO2 per ton mile, to be calculated for each new design. The required index for new designs will be gradually lowered in the coming years resulting in either improved energy efficiencies or speed reductions.<br/>...