Special Issue on “PARADIGM SHIFT TOWARDS SUSTAINABLE RESILIENT BUILT ENVIRONMENT”

Background and Rationale

We are pleased to alert you to our call for papers from the above journal [BEPAM] for a Special Issue on “Paradigm Shift towards Sustainable Resilient Built Environment”

Recent calamities the world face today have pitched the trajectory of sustainability and resilience themes towards more urgent applications. This urgency has been spurred by the implications of COVID-19, the resultant fiscal and economic crises, and the special characteristics of the construction industry. The ever-changing social and economic conditions in the new normal require many novel studies to unveil, articulate and help strategise the required change in basic assumptions toward sustainable resilient built environment. Accordingly, the proposed theme of the Special Issue (SI) was conceived to elicit and investigate the expectations of the change in basic assumptions towards a sustainable resilient built environment and to propose modifications to the practices of sustainable development of buildings and infrastructure, energy and retrofitting, green building systems, increased off-site construction, and circular built environment applications. Construction organisations’ investments in innovative technologies for sustainability, knowledge management and lessons learned, need to be proactively transformed to achieve the envisioned shifting paradigm for resilient sustainable construction.

Alleviations of the current strains on project delivery and competitiveness may be temporary and thus, may necessitate new strategies hence revisiting and reviewing current roles of construction management referring to aspects of project planning, design, financing, procurement, contract administration, dispute resolution, performance management, with modern construction methodologies including increased off-site construction components and digital tools for enabling the transformation towards sustainable resilient built environment. Globally, there is lack of guidance on managing special or widespread disasters. Therefore researchers, together with practitioners where possible, should develop synergistic solutions to handle these well. Similarly, there is a disconnection between residual traditional practices and the new requirements for handling the operation and management of facilities, waste management, and health, safety and wellbeing. Hence, the key question to ask is “How and to what extent should the built environment shift its principles and practices for establishing sustainable resilience from an optimal holistic paradigm shift?” Therefore, the SI would elicit new research and development (R&D) that is essential for explaining, exploring, and confirming the expected novel behaviours and strategies that shift the present built environment sector paradigm towards a sustainable resilience. Within this context, the SI is also expected to address these existing challenges and potential risks that would hinder the paradigm shift towards sustainable resilience and uncover new models, methodologies and integrated ways forward to proactively smoothen the paradigm shift.

Objectives of this Special Issue

The proposed Special Issue expects to inspire the authors to develop papers to address the following specific objectives:

To capture and synthesise emerging expectations of the shifting paradigm towards resilient sustainable construction with respect to resilience to pandemics and other disasters; and also, in terms of sustainable development of buildings and infrastructure, energy optimisation, retrofitting, green building systems, increased off-site construction and circular built environment applications
To investigate, consolidate and unveil how innovative technologies and methodologies for sustainability, knowledge management and lessons learned need to be proactively transformed and deployed to achieve the envisioned paradigm shift to resilient sustainable construction in building and civil engineering infrastructure, covering urban, suburban and rural infrastructure
To revisit current roles of construction project management with a view to integrated improvements, in project planning, design, financing, procurement, contract administration, construction management, dispute resolution, and performance evaluation tools including Digital Twins, Building Information Modelling (BIM) for facilitating and accelerating the transformation towards sustainable resilient built environment
To investigate, analyse and promote revised priorities, principles, and practices in built environment, for sustainable disaster resilience in-built circularly environment including from pandemics and epidemics, with resilience taken to include that of discrete built assets such as a building, as well as of infrastructure networks such as rail or road networks; and also, of construction supply chains
To analyse, consolidate and communicate how best to identify and handle operations and management of facilities, waste management, and health, safety and wellbeing to contribute to sustainable resilient built environment

Anticipated Themes of papers

The following is an indicative, hence a non-exhaustive, list of anticipated themes that could be explored in different papers in this Special Issue:

Sustainable Urban Development and Infrastructure
Knowledge Management and reflections on Lessons Learned
Sustainable Resilience informed Design, Construction Management and Dispute Resolution
Innovative Procurement incorporating a focus on Sustainability and Resilience
Increased Off-site construction to reduce vulnerabilities and increase resilience
Digital technologies and tools to strengthen sustainability and resilience
Health, Safety and Wellbeing
Waste Management
Energy and Retrofitting
Green Building Systems
Disaster Resilient Built Environments
Enhancing Construction Performance
Circular Built Environment
Sustainable Operation and Management of Facilities

Submission Guidelines

Submissions to Built Environment Project and Asset Management should be through ScholarOne Manuscripts. Registration and access are available at:

http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/bepam

Author guidelines must be strictly followed. Please see:

http://www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/products/journals/author_guidelines.htm?id=bepam

The total wordcount limit is 8,500 words, since it is anew BEPAM submission. Please also see the author guidelines for the computation method, including the need to add (a) the total wordcount of all Tables and Figures (with each Table or Figure counted as 280 words), to (b) the wordcount of all text including the Abstract, References and any Appendices (if the latter is in text); and ensure the Grand Total [of (a) and (b)] is within the strict 8,500 limit. Submitted articles must not have been previously published, nor should they be submitted for consideration for publication elsewhere, while under review for this journal.

Interested authors should select (from the drop-down menu) the special issue “Paradigm Shift towards Sustainable Resilient Built Environment” at the appropriate step in the submission process, i.e. in response to “Please select the issue you are submitting to”.

Key Dates

Papers to be considered for this Special Issue should be submitted through the above portal on or before 15^th December 2022 (Deadline).

Note: If considered useful by potential authors, Draft Abstracts may be submitted for consideration before 25 August 2022. If so, these must be in the structured Emerald format i.e. under prescribed sub-headings, as specified in the Author Guidelines; and submitted to Dr. Chandanie Hadiwattege to [email protected]

Following the submission and initial screening of the manuscripts, those judged suitable for the special issue will be sent to at least two independent referees for double blind peer review, after which submissions may be recommended for revisions and further review, acceptance or rejection.

BEPAM Journal

BEPAM is an internationally established Emerald journal; and is one of the three CIB recognised journals. It is also recognised by other prominent bodies such as the Australian Business Deans Council and indexed in renowned databases such as SCOPUS, EBSCO, INSPEC as well as in ESCI (Emerging Sources Citation Index) of Clarivate Analytics (previously of Thomson Reuters) in “Web of Science”.

For further information on the journal, please visit here,

We look forward to your submissions. Reminder: Full paper submissions are welcome through this specific BEPAM Special Issue submission Portal, BUT we regret that any new submissions after the deadline of 15^th December 2022 cannot be considered.

With best regards

Guest Editors:

Dr. Chandanie Hadiwattege

Department of Building Economics, Faculty of Architecture, University of Moratuwa, Katubedda, 10400, Sri Lanka.

Email: [email protected]

Dr Nirodha Fernando

School of Engineering & the Built Environment, Edinburgh Napier University ,Merchiston Campus,10 Colinton Road, Edinburgh, EH10 5DT, Scotland, UK

Email: [email protected]

Dr Thanuja Ramachandra

Department of Building Economics, Faculty of Architecture, University of Moratuwa, Katubedda, 10400, Sri Lanka. Email: [email protected]