Rapid urbanisation and climate change are two of the major challenges of our time. People living in cities' poorest areas are agents of change both in terms of climate mitigation and adaptation.

This new publication explores the intertwining nature of circular economy, urbanisation and poverty.  It looks at how existing approaches of circularity and the informal economy can be taken up and reinforced to find solutions to these challenges.

The Friendship Hospital Satkhira, designed by Kasef Chowdhury/URBANA, is built to serve a rural population in the Bangladesh delta. The community hospital of eighty beds was initiated by a donation of land by a local philanthropist.

The construction in bricks built in situ celebrates this ordinary material without having to resort to complex technology leading to increased budgets. Local materials by local craftmanship helps the integration of the building to the native culture and society.

This project won the RIBA International Prize 2021

The temperature of cities continues to increase because of the heat island phenomenon and the undeniable climatic change. The observed high ambient temperatures intensify the energy problem of cities, deteriorates comfort conditions, put in danger the vulnerable population and amplify the pollution problems.

Using the methodology presented in the Eco-innovation Manual, this supplement on building materials provides sector-specific information and guidance to sustainability consultancy service providers supporting companies in eco-innovation. It should be used alongside the Manual to provide further context at each step and examples of how the methodology, activities and templates can be applied in real life to a company in the building materials sector.

There is little record or literature concerning bioclimatic building in warm climate zones. One of the main goals of ABC21 project is to cover this information gap – collecting data about operating buildings that are good examples of sustainable solutions and should be replicated. An analysis of the local climate and a description of the main bioclimatic features is presented for each building, with examples shown from Italy, Portugal, Senegal, France, Morocco, Kenya, Sudan and La Reunion.

Urban cooling is a recent subject and the knowledge produced by research and the first experiments give various results, sometimes difficult to decipher for operational actors.

This guide offers a synthetic, multi-criteria and operational approach to emerging or proven solutions, adapted to different climatic and urban contexts. It is a question of clarifying the decision of the public and private actors, as well on their choices of installation, construction, renovation of the buildings as of installation of the external spaces.

 

This practical guide demonstrates how buildings and community spaces can be constructed to increase their resilience to climate change, especially in developing countries where structures are largely self-built. The publication provides an overview of the fundamental types of interventions at the building scale, including the use of nature-based solutions. The guide offers construction solutions to adapt to a range of different risks in various climates.

UN Secretary-General calls latest IPCC WG1 Climate Report a ‘Code Red for Humanity’, stressing ‘irrefutable’ evidence of human influence, and that “climate impacts will undoubtedly worsen”.

The Global Status Report for Buildings and Construction (Buildings-GSR) is a flagship publication of the UNEP-hosted Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC). The Buildings-GSR provides an annual snapshot of the progress of the buildings and construction sector on a global scale and reviews the status of policies, finance, technologies, and solutions to monitor whether the sector is aligned with the Paris Agreement goals. It also provides stakeholders with evidence to persuade policymakers and the overall buildings and construction community to take action.

This report - Sri Lanka Roadmap for Sustainable Housing and Construction 2020 – 2050 - presents the findings of the Sustainable Building Construction Country Assessment for Sri Lanka (SBC-CA) and a Roadmap for Sustainable Housing and Construction and achieving NDCs in the construction industry in Sri Lanka. It examines the current status, and potential opportunities and challenges for adopting Sustainable Building Construction (SBC) practices and policies.