Built environment represents the man-made surroundings providing setting for human activity, and so encompasses places and spaces that were created or modified by people including buildings, parks, and transportation systems. Despite the multiple benefits for living people, built environments of today are created through usage of large amounts of energy and materials, affecting the health of humans and the natural environment in negative manners. This aspect is amplified by built environments enhancing because of cities expanding to meet necessities and requirements of an increasing number of people.
The built environment is responsible for both consumption of resources and energies, the generation of wastes, and the emission of greenhouse gases and other pollutants, with the consequent environmental impacts: buildings is the largest contributor. It is one most energy demanding sector due to the consumption of energy which, indeed, represents around 40% of the global energy demands. This should be attributed not only to the energy spent to maintain the inside environment through heating and cooling, lighting, and operating building appliances but, also, with the energy that is sequestered in buildings and building materials during production, on-site construction, and final demolition and disposal. This is called “embodied energy”, and usually considered as being divided into two primary components: direct and indirect. The direct component is used for construction, maintenance, renovation and demolition of buildings, whilst the indirect one is consumed for production of the materials utilised for building construction and assembly. The embodied energy represents from 10 to 30% of the energy consumed overall in the life cycle of a building: so, it is understood that solutions for mitigation of the embodied energy share can make the difference for a building compared to another one. In this context, the selection of low energy and resource demanding materials is an essential element to be considered for the design and construction of buildings with reduced energy consumptions and environmental impacts in their life cycles. A valid solution in this sense could be to utilise materials produced through sustainable recovery and processing systems of by-products and/or wastes.
This issue is increasingly gaining attention of researchers, producers, decision and policy makers, and plays multiple key-roles for the sustainability of urban and rural buildings. It enables waste valorisation, and can contribute reduction of the cannibalisation phenomenon that is currently occurring for material and energy resources, due to the increasing globalisation and industrialisation.
This paper was conceived to analysis the state-of-the-art in the field of recovery and processing systems of by-products and wastes into material commodities usable in buildings, as well as their transportation to the construction yard, so analysing the energy consumption associated with the logistics system. The study was so conducted with the aim of highlighting: what has been done thus far; where the gaps are; and what solutions and strategies can be taken to improve those systems and, at the same time, to make and boost innovation. Doing so could contribute to a better understanding of the research field investigated, and to the enhancement of the subject knowledge and literature.
Finally, such a field was investigated by the authors in the light of the interest and attention that it is increasingly gathering, and because waste management and buildings can be coupled in ways that make them overall sustainable, and allow for production of sustainable buildings.
6c. Infrastructure and transportation
