Assessment of Sustainable Construction Measures in Building Refurbishment—Life Cycle Comparison of Conventional and Multi-Active Façade Systems in a Social Housing Complex

Stefan Sattler and Doris Österreicher
Additional contact information
Stefan Sattler: Department of Civil Engineering and Natural Hazards, Institute of Structural Engineering, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, 1190 Vienna, Austria
Doris Österreicher: Department of Landscape, Spatial and Infrastructure Sciences, Institute of Spatial Planning, Environmental Planning and Land Rearrangement, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, 1190 Vienna, Austria

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 16, 1-22

Abstract: Building refurbishment plays a key role in the de-carbonization of the European building stock. Whilst the renewal of the thermal envelope increases energy efficiency during the operational phase, the type of material is highly relevant for the overall environmental impact of the refurbishment. Expanded polystyrene (EPS) is most widely used for external thermal insulation systems but is also a material based on fossil resources. Thus, alternatives made from renewable raw materials must be more widely used in order to reach the climate goals. However, comparable data on long-term material effects over the life cycle are needed for developers and planners to make informed decisions. In a Viennese case study for the largest social housing property manager in Europe, two different façade systems have been analyzed to assess the overall environmental impact of the materials. In a comprehensive life cycle assessment, a Multi-Active Façade system based on recycled paper has been compared with a conventional external thermal insulation composite system (ETICS) using EPS. It shows that whilst the evaluation during the operational phase alone results in a similar ecological footprint of the ETICS, the analysis over the whole life cycle provides a clear positive indication for the novel Multi-Active Façade.

Keywords: building refurbishment; thermal insulation materials; life cycle assessment; global warming potential; expanded polystyrene; ETICS; multi-active façade; cellulose insulation board (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/16/4487/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/16/4487/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:16:p:4487-:d:258969

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().