This book presents a critical review of a criterion of risk, created to assess the flood risk to heritage buildings, and evaluates this criterion by applying it to the sample Portuguese heritage buildings. In a first approach, the total number of potential parameters is effectively reduced and the selected criteria are divided into two different groups: the monument’s location in relation to a waterway, and the behaviour of its construction material in contact with water. Above all, the book discusses the importance of architectural heritage and argues for the need to safeguard it from extreme climatic phenomena such as floods. As such, the book vividly reminds the scientific community that the intensification of the global warming and climate change will worsen throughout the 21st century, and that it is therefore necessary to adopt preventive measures to minimize, mitigate and control these adverse effects if we hope to avoid catastrophic consequences. At the same time, the book takes into account a broad range of scientific and engineering disciplines, such as civil engineering and architecture, offering a synthesis of the current state of knowledge to benefit and guide experts and practitioners in related fields.

The main purpose of this book, Hygrothermal, Building Pathology and Durability, is to provide a collection of recent research works to contribute to the systematization and dissemination of knowledge related to construction pathology, hygrothermal behaviour of buildings, durability and diagnostic techniques and, simultaneously, to show the most recent advances in this domain. It includes a set of new developments in the field of building physics and hygrothermal behaviour, durability approach for historical and old buildings and building pathology vs. durability. The book is divided in several chapters that are a resume of the current state of knowledge for benefit of professional colleagues, scientists, students, practitioners, lecturers and other interested parties to network.

Construction systems parts, Construction materials, Moisture, Moisture measurement, Water absorption, Water vapour, Condensation, Humidity, Rainfall, Heat transfer, Drying, Mathematical calculations, Simulation, Thermal design of buildings

Chapter “A Multi-functional Design Approach to Deal with New Urban Challenges” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

T​his book contains selected papers presented during the World Renewable Energy Network’s biannual World Med Green Forum (MGF). The 2022 MGF highlights the role of renewable energy applications in the sustainable building sector with a focus on the Mediterranean region as a foundation for a truly positive energy future. MGF is an open roundtable for an international community of researchers, practitioners, and experts to discuss the most innovative and promising sustainable building technologies. The papers presented explore the intersection between twin transitions in policies, programs, projects, and experimentation, with the digital domain innovating the green building sector towards more reliable and inclusive planning and design practices in order to collectively envision future buildings and cities.

The book “Building Energy Audits-Diagnosis and Retrofitting” is a collection of twelve papers that focus on the built environment in order to systematically collect and analyze relevant data for the energy use profile of buildings and extended for the sustainability assessment of the built environment. The contributions address historic buildings, baselines for non-residential buildings from energy performance audits, and from in-situ measurements, monitoring, and analysis of data, and verification of energy saving and model calibration for various building types. The works report on how to diagnose existing problems and identify priorities, assess, and quantify the opportunities and measures that improve the overall building performance and the environmental quality and well-being of occupants in non-residential buildings and houses. Several case studies and lessons learned from the field are presented to help the readers identify, quantify, and prioritize effective energy conservation and efficiency measures. Finally, a new urban sustainability audit and rating method of the built environment addresses the complexities of the various issues involved, providing practical tools that can be adapted to match local priorities in order to diagnose and evaluate the current state and future scenarios towards meeting specific sustainable development goals and local priorities.

Architectural heritage is now recognised to be of great importance to the historical identity. In order to take care of the architectural heritage of a region, town or nation, now recognised as of great importance to their historical identify, we need to share experiences and knowledge regarding heritage preservation in many parts of the world.Covering advances in this field presented at the thirteenth in a series of now-biennial conferences that began in 1989, this book covers such topics as Heritage architecture and historical aspects; Learning from the past; Surveying and monitoring; Performance and maintenance; Structural restoration of metallic structures; Preservation and monitoring; Earth construction; Modern (19th/20th century) heritage; Maritime heritage; Heritage masonry buildings; Stone masonry walls; Wooden structures; Simulation and modelling; Material characterization; New technologies or materials; Corrosion and material Decay; Seismic vulnerability; Non-destructive techniques; Assessment and re-use of heritage buildings; Heritage and tourism; Social and economic aspects in heritage; Guidelines, codes and regulations for heritage.