Topic Review
Comparison between Traditional (Passive) Learning and Active Learning
Active learning has been increasingly important in tertiary education due to its powerfully favourable impact on students’ learning attitudes and efficacy. The way that a classroom is set up has a direct impact on how well students learn and how well teachers teach. The continuous evaluation of students’ learning performance is essential for guiding future classroom renovations and creating a cutting-edge learning environment for both students and teachers.
  • 1.4K
  • 20 Jun 2023
Topic Review
Fundamental Building Solutions for Expansive Soils
Expansive soils exist in many countries worldwide, and their characteristics make them exceedingly difficult to engineer. Due to its significant swelling and shrinkage characteristics, expansive soil defies many of the stabilization solutions available to engineers. Differential heave or settlement occurs when expansive soil swells or shrinks, causing severe damage to foundations, buildings, roadways, and retaining structures. In such soils, it is necessary to construct a foundation that avoids the adverse effects of settlement.
  • 1.4K
  • 06 May 2023
Topic Review
Photovoltaics on Landmark Buildings
This study, framed in the Work group 4 “Photovoltaic in built environment” within the COST Action PEARL PV, CA16235, aims to examine applications of integrated and applied photovoltaic technologies on ten landmark buildings characterised by distinctive geometries, highlighting the aesthetics of their architecture and quality of PV integration based on a proposed set of seven criteria.
  • 1.4K
  • 24 Oct 2020
Topic Review
Microwave Irradiation and Wastewater
Every year, the human impact on the world’s water sources becomes more pronounced. One of the triggers to this increase is the use of ineffective wastewater and sludge treatment systems. Recently, the number of studies of microwave processing in handling liquid municipal and industrial waste has increased. This paper discusses heat treatment, change in properties, decomposition of substances, removal of metals, demulsification, pyrolysis, biogas processing, disinfection, and other topics. 
  • 1.4K
  • 04 Aug 2021
Topic Review
Intelligent Buildings in Smart Grids
During the last decade, the smart grid (SG) concept has started to become a reality, mainly thanks to the technical progress achieved in telecommunications, informatics and power electronics, among other domains, leading to an evolution of the traditional electrical grid into an intelligent one. Nowadays, the SG can be seen as a system of smart systems that include cyber and physical parts from different technologies that interact with each other. In this context, intelligent buildings (IBs) constitute a paradigm in which such smart systems are able to guarantee the comfort of residents while ensuring an appropriate tradeoff of energy production and consumption by means of an energy management system (EMS).
  • 1.3K
  • 08 Jun 2021
Topic Review
Sustainability Requirements of Residential Buildings
The COVID-19 pandemic is bringing about changes, and alongside these, we can alter the way we design our living spaces. The need for a healthy and comfortable living space is essential to mental, physical well-being, and personal comfort. This entry shows how is COVID-19 Experience Transforming Sustainability Requirements of Residential Buildings.
  • 1.3K
  • 27 Jan 2021
Topic Review
Alternative Clinker Technologies for Reducing Carbon Emissions
The production of one ton of Ordinary Portland Cement releases considerable amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. As the need and demand for this material grows exponentially, it has become a challenge to increase its production at a time when climate-related problems represent a major global concern. The two main CO2 contributors in this process are fossil fuel combustion to heat the rotary kiln and the chemical reaction associated with the calcination process, in the production of the clinker, the main component of OPC. The current entry presents a critical review of the existent alternative clinker technologies (ACTs) that are under an investigation trial phase or under restricted use for niche applications and that lead to reduced emissions of CO2.
  • 1.3K
  • 24 Jan 2022
Topic Review Peer Reviewed
Opportunities for Catalytic Reactions and Materials in Buildings
Residential and commercial buildings are responsible for over 30% of global final energy consumption and accounts for ~40% of annual direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions. Energy efficient and sustainable technologies are necessary to not only lower the energy footprint but also lower the environmental burden. Many proven and emerging technologies are being pursued to meet the ever-increasing energy demand. Catalytic science has a significant new role to play in helping address sustainable energy challenges, particularly in buildings, compared to transportation and industrial sectors. Thermally driven heat pumps, dehumidification, cogeneration, thermal energy storage, carbon capture and utilization, emissions suppression, waste-to-energy conversion, and corrosion prevention technologies can tap into the advantages of catalytic science in realizing the full potential of such approaches, quickly, efficiently, and reliably. Catalysts can help increase energy conversion efficiency in building related technologies but must utilize low cost, easily available and easy-to-manufacture materials for large scale deployment. This entry presents a comprehensive overview of the impact of each building technology area on energy demand and environmental burden, state-of-the-art of catalytic solutions, research, and development opportunities for catalysis in building technologies, while identifying requirements, opportunities, and challenges.
  • 1.3K
  • 18 Apr 2022
Topic Review
Recycled Concrete Aggregates Applications in Asphalt Paving
The sustainability of road pavements is highly influenced by the proper selection of the materials used in the production and construction. The material circularity principle aims to completely or partially replace traditional aggregates and fillers with wastes or by-products. Adapting asphalt mixtures to incorporate waste materials reduces the consumption of naturally mined materials, minimizing the carbon footprint and pavement industry’s impact on the environment. Furthermore, the use of waste materials minimizes landfill volumes and limits the disposal of waste produced from various sources. Thus, this document discusses the use of recycled concrete aggregates (RCA) from construction and demolition waste (CDW) as alternative aggregates for application in asphalt paving.
  • 1.3K
  • 06 May 2022
Topic Review
Shelter Self-Recovery
The term “self-recovery” is used in the humanitarian shelter and settlements sector to mean the process whereby disaster-affected households repair, build, or rebuild their homes using their own resources supplemented with assistance from humanitarian organizations. 
  • 1.2K
  • 01 Jul 2022
  • Page
  • of
  • 26