Future Trends of Sustainability Design and Analysis in Construction Industry and Academia

Abstract

Because of the negative environmental and social impacts of built environment activities, several rating systems were developed in the last two decades to help professionals evaluate the sustainability of their design and construction decisions. A recent study revealed that industry leaders reported the shortcomings of these rating systems to provide accurate valuation of the return on their green investments. The study suggested the development of new evaluation processes that consider the triple-bottom-line (TBL) aspects (social, environmental, and financial) of project sustainability in a more holistic approach. Accordingly, this paper identifies the gaps between current practices and envisioned TBL-based practices through the following three main tasks: (1) surveying industry professionals to identify their current practices and required skills of sustainable design and construction; (2) surveying a sample of national academic engineering programs to identify current offerings of required sustainability courses; and (3) applying needs assessment to highlight the gaps and needed actions for achieving envisioned practices. It is proposed to implement a top-bottom action plan to develop new TBL-based processes that better inform sustainable/green investors and owners.