Technological advancements in green and sustainable construction

This chapter examines the technological advancements in promoting green and sustainable practices in the construction industry. Green and sustainable construction practices have in recent times become topical issues among construction researchers and practitioners. These have become necessary due to the quest to provide responses to mitigate the numerous negative environmental effects of the construction industry. The global construction industry contributes to 5.7 billion tons of carbon emissions, equalling to 23% of global carbon emissions from economic activities. Several global agreements including the Paris Agreement, Kyoto Protocol, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) all entreat the uptake of measures in minimising environmental impacts resulting from industries. Advancements in technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), blockchain, Building Information Modelling (BIM), Digital Twin (DT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) are aiding the promotion of green and sustainable practices. These technologies are used in the areas of carbon emissions reduction, energy consumption optimisation, carbon sequestration, construction waste management, whole life cycle costing, among others. Studying the utilisation of technologies relating to the advancement of green and sustainable construction practices provide interesting insights into the innovative processes implemented by researchers in minimising the construction industry's environmental impacts. The findings of this chapter include the technologies in green and sustainable construction, carbon as a metric for judging sustainability, and state-of-the-art sustainable construction trends to resolve sustainability-related issues. Discussions on the implications of the findings on green and sustainable practices within the construction industry are presented with suggestions for future research.