In the scope of architecture and construction, buildings are responsible for about 30% of the total production of carbon dioxide in their life cycle, considering the construction, operation and maintenance phases (and its deconstruction and selective dismantling), due to the high consumption of fossil fuels, the large and uncriterious use of resources, and the excessive production of waste. It is also supported by low productivity workforce and high marketing costs. It is thus urgent to reduce the negative environmental impacts that this industry produces, hence the need for its integration in the realm and principles of sustainable construction. In this regard, it is necessary to develop different construction models, using more productive technologies, less raw and more renewable materials, reducing the negative impacts resulting from the consumption of natural resources, reducing waste, pollution and energy consumption.

Keywords: Sustainable Construction Building Materials Construction Technologies Energy Efficiency Colour

The Research Group Technologies of Architecture has the aim to research in several fields related with building technology and the environment, from the perspective of sustainable construction, which claims a built environment as a result of a global and sustainable approach. These research areas include, among others, the study and understanding of materials for sustainable construction, the rehabilitation of the built environment, energy efficiency and the study of colour in architecture.

1. Sustainable Construction

Responsible: Alberto Cruz Reaes Pinto
Brief description: The knowledge of materials and their techniques within construction, energy efficiency and waste reduction, within the principles of Sustainable Construction, is critical to minimize the negative environmental impacts resulting from the building construction industry. The research line Sustainable Construction aims to integrate research projects related to the construction and management of buildings within the principles of Sustainable Construction.

Keywords: Sustainable Construction Building Materials Construction Technologies Energy Efficiency Construction Waste Buildings

2. Industrialized Construction

Responsible: Alberto Cruz Reaes Pinto
Brief description: The construction market has great prospects due to the shortage in housing and the demand for public works, far from being overcome. The high dispersion and disorganisation in building construction companies, the dramatic lack of skilled labour, the demands for quality from promotors, and the need to increase productivity and to lower construction prices, justify the application of industrialised technologies, and namely prefabrication, in the interest of quality and productivity. The construction site tends to become an assemblage station for industrialised products and prefabricated components, substituting on-site work with factory work, favouring working conditions, the reduction of on-site personnel, the coordination of all the activities that take place there, and also the reduction of waste products.

Keywords: Industrialization Prefabrication Standardization Technology Construction Materials

3. Rehabilitation of the Built Environment

Responsible: Alberto Cruz Reaes Pinto
Overview: In the context of the great shortage of housing in Portugal and the imbalance in the market between supply and demand, the rehabilitation of the built environment, namely of buildings, is a very significant potential market for increasing supply and helping to reduce these shortages, producing less negative environmental impact than the construction of new dwellings, while also prolonging the useful life of the buildings and their cultural identity.

Keywords: Rehabilitation of the Built Environment Rehabilitation of the Built Heritage Sustainable Development

4. The Colour in Architecture

Responsible: Cristina Maria dos Santos Nunes Pires Caramelo Gomes
Brief description: The Laboratory of Colour aims to provide scientific responses to projects on colour in various areas, disseminate knowledge of the research carried out and promote its application in the field of science, architecture and design, in close connection with other universities, with companies and with civil society in general. The research team of the ‘Junqueira Street’ study project has been developing its activity in the analysis of the relationship between colour, architecture and intervention technologies in the rehabilitation processes of the built heritage and the projects of ongoing research are within this scope.

Keywords: Colour Architecture Urban Environment Chromatic Composition Public Space

Global Scientific Production