Expertise and Subject Areas

CSD is structured around three principal research themes: i) Environmental Management, Performance and Politics; ii) Construction Management and Economics; and iii) Architectural Planning and Design. The combined output of these has a direct positive impact on a range of stakeholders that include industry, professional practice, academia, the public sector, influential policy makers, and designated end users. Societal engagement is also a fundamental tenet of our work. A detailed breakdown of our research themes is as shown in the following Figure.  

For more information about the Centre for Sustainable Development please read our Brochure

 

Impact

CSD Events

The CSD recognises and fully endorses the cross-disciplinary nature of the sustainability agenda, and our team of researchers and PhD students are truly multidisciplinary. Sustainability involves a number of important areas not least; the natural sciences, design, environmental issues, engineering, social sciences, health and economics. CSD organises, hosts and leads International Conferences. CSD members have also been involved in the organisation of other research conferences and symposia, including the Association of Researchers in Construction Management’s annual conference (ARCOM), the RICS COBRA annual conference, and the COST Symposium on Investigating Cultural Sustainability. A series of workshops and seminars are also run by CSD members, supported by a range of professional bodies, local authorities, commercial organisations and industry.

Conferences and External Events

CIB World Building Congress 2016

Prof. Jack Goulding has been invited to Co-Chair the CIB World Building Congress 2016 in Tampere, Finland from 30th May to 3rd June.

Jack is responsible for “Creating built environments of new opportunities”, which includes themes involving infrastructure networks, competitiveness, investments, security and multidisciplinary solutions.

For more details about the event go to http://www.wbc16.com/ ; the twitter hashtag is #WBC16 and the account is @WBC16_

Seminars

The CSD Seminar Series provokes comments and debate on issues surrounding Sustainable Development. Previous subjects include:

• Building Information Modelling
• Public Private Partnerships
• Offsite Manufacturing
• Virtual Reality and Visualisation in Construction
• Sustainable Buildings
• Climate change

Engagement and Outreach

A number of research areas of CSD have received both national and international recognition. CSD members have notably been invited as keynote speakers at national and international conferences, received prestigious awards and are regularly being interviewed in the media. The Centre has also hosted staff from Africa, Germany, Greece, Turkey, Russia, New Zealand, and the USA.

Key outreach events include:

• Professor Gary Holt presented an inaugural lecture on Construction Equipment Evolution at Birmingham City University, UK 2012.
• Professor Jack Goulding and Renuka Thakore were invited expert panel members at the 2nd International Conference on Socio-Political and Technological Dimensions of Climate Change conference in Malaysia 2012.
• Chris O’Flaherty presented his work through the University’s high exposure public Guild Lecture series in 2012.
• Dr. Umit Isikdag gave a keynote on Building Information Modelling at a high profile UCLAN industry event in 2012.
• Professor Jack Goulding gave a keynote address on Innovation in Construction at Beykent University, Turkey in 2011.
• Dean of School Professor Akintola Akintoye received an award for his contribution to the construction industry at the 2011 Plant and Equipment Management Innovation Conference (PEMIC) in Birmingham in 2011.
• Professor Jack Goulding was invited to be an expert panel member at Energy and Carbon Efficiency in Construction, Eric Wright/CIRIA, Preston, UK, 28 November 2011.

Publications

CSD is extremely active on the world academic stage. Its members have authored and published several books, over 100 refereed academic journal articles, and presented in excess of 200 papers at national and international conferences over the last four years. Many CSD staff are also Editors of several leading journals in the field. Please see below for a selection of publications from the Centre for Sustainable Development.

Journals Edited by CSD Members

• Construction Innovation is an international journal which provides high quality technical papers on current developments within the construction industry on a worldwide basis. Special emphasis is placed on innovation (information, process, and management). Construction Innovation is a CIB Encouraged Journal.

• The Journal of Financial Management of Property and Construction provides an international forum which brings together theoretical and practical developments and new thinking in the financial management of property and construction. The journal also presents a platform for the exchange of ideas in relation to cost implications of sustainability issues. The journal is a CIB Encouraged Journal.

• Prof. Goulding and Dr Pour Rahimian have been selected as Guest Editors for a Special Issue in IJAR of AEC design visualisation and integration. This presents new theoretical and practice signposts for future research in AEC Design Visualisation. For further details, please see http://www.archnet-ijar.net/index.php/IJAR/issue/view/32

• Dr Wafaa Nadim and Prof. Jack Goulding have been selected as Guest Editors for a Special Issue in SASBE titled “A smart future for a rapidly urbanising Africa: sustainable integrated approaches for the built environment”. This is particularly pertinent, considering the COP21 agenda and agreements secured in Paris. For further details, please see www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/products/journals/call_for_papers.htm?id=6152

Selected Books Authored / Edited by CSD Members

• Two CSD Members, Professor Akintola Akintoye and Professor Jack Goulding, in collaboration with Dr. Girma Zawdie from the University of Strathclyde Glasgow, co-authored the book titled ‘Construction Innovation and Process Improvement’. This edited book, published by Wiley-Blackwell, provides an essential insight into the impact of innovation within the Architecture, Engineering and Construction sectors. It highlights a number of important innovation initiatives, concepts and applications for delivering competitive advantage using research and practice from different countries and contexts.

• Associate Member, Professor Tom Woolley’s new book, ‘Low Impact Building: Housing using Renewable Materials’ is now out, published by Wiley-Blackwell. This book focuses on the way we build houses to reduce their ‘carbon’ footprint and help minimise environmental damage. The book explains how this can be achieved by reducing the energy and environmental impact of materials and resources used to construct buildings; and, by choosing alternative products and systems.

• Members of the CSD collaborated on the following publication - Brown, M., Akintoye, A., and Goulding, J.S., (2013), Public Private Partnerships: Towards New Innovative Collaborations, Centre for Sustainable Development, Grenfell-Baines School of Architecture, Construction and Environment, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, UK ISBN: 978-1-901922-93-6. For purchase please contact Jack Goulding in the CSD Office on 01772 89 4213 (School of Engineering).

• Prof. Akintoye has published a new book on Public Private Partnerships. This presents a global perspective on PPP, supported by 21 case studies. For further information, please see Amazon.

 

Proceedings and Special Issues in Journals edited by CSD members

• Proceedings of 9th International Detail Design in Architecture Conference
  Edited by: Akintola Akintoye, Jack Goulding, Farzad Pour Rahimian, David Brindley and Stephen Emmit
  ISBN: 1901922766

• Proceedings of 1st International Conference on “Revisiting the Socio-Political and Technological Dimensions of Climate Change
  Edited by: Celine Germond-Duret, Jack Goulding, Farzad Pour Rahimian and Akintola Akintoye
  ISBN: 1901922790

• Proceedings of 2nd International Conference on “Revisiting the Socio-Political and Technological Dimensions of Climate Change
  Edited by: Farzad Pour Rahimian, Rahinah Ibrahim, Jack Goulding and Abang Abdullah Abang Ali
  ISBN: 9789679603279

• Proceedings of the Public Private Partnership Body of Knowledge Conference (‘P3BooK’)
  Edited by: Akintola Akintoye, Champika Liyanage and Jack Goulding

Internal and External Communication

Selected Reports

• The CIB Task Group TG74, led by Professor Jack Goulding, Director of CSD, launched a roadmap for future research through the International Council for Research Innovation in Building and Construction (CIB). This document sets out the background and scope of contemporary offsite manufacturing globally, discussing the state of the art and the main challenges to its implementation that are faced today.

Latest CSD Newsletters

• Summer 2016
• Issue WINTER 2015-16
• Issue 5
• Issue 4

Other Newsletters

• North West Construction Knowledge Hub (NWCKH) Newsletter
• University Research Newsletter
• School Research Newsletter
• Sustainability Supplement

Events and News

CIB World Building Congress 2016

Events that we are organising or have been asked to take part in, both nationally and internationally will be listed here.

Prof. Jack Goulding has been invited to Co-Chair the CIB World Building Congress 2016 in Tampere, Finland from 30th May to 3rd June.

Jack is responsible for “Creating built environments of new opportunities”, which includes themes involving infrastructure networks, competitiveness, investments, security and multidisciplinary solutions.

For more details about the event go to http://www.wbc16.com/ ; the twitter hashtag is #WBC16 and the account is @WBC16_

‘Working Commission W121’

Prof. Jack Goulding has been appointed Joint Coordinator of a new Working Commission W121 on offsite manufacturing. This is a high profile activity which will look at new business models, process integration, design decisions and supply chain synergies etc. The CIB recognised the importance this has on the global community, citing TG74's roadmap as a strong foundation.

This Working Commission will focus on high impact, high value issues on offsite implementation; acting as formal conduit for promoting offsite as an important research area among new and early career researchers. Knowledge creation, exchange and dissemination will concentrate explicitly on impact and outreach.

For further information, please visit the CIB World website

Courses and Postgraduate Study

The CSD continues to consolidate the instrumental role that it performs in the cutting-edge development and effective knowledge transfer of sustainability issues. An exemplar of this is the bespoke teaching and learning module that it developed on present Issues in Sustainability; which due to its success has also been made available as a University Certificate. The CSD contributes research driven subject-specialist knowledge to many other university teaching and learning modules; across many courses and at a variety of award levels. These include:

• Sustainable Futures
• Sustainable Development in the Built Environment
• Building Technology
• Tectonic Design
• MSc Building Conservation and Regeneration

The Centre’s researchers and allied professionals from a number of related disciplines, also deliver specialist presentations on key issues of our time; with a view to reinforcing a common set of shared academic and theoretical principles, as well as practical ideas about how they may be put into real world practice and hence achieve tangible impact.

Courses underpinned by sustainability within the School of Engineering are listed below.

Social Media

• Centre for Sustainable Development blog

• Follow CSD on Twitter @CSDUCLan

• Recently, two members of CSD were named by UK magazine BD-Online as being among the top 10 most influential architectural education tweeters in the UK. This is a phenomenal achievement and accordingly, the centre offers congratulations to Ann Vanner (@annvanner) and Jenni Barrett (@Meme_Cloud). Both Ann and Jenni were also named in the top 100 most useful architectural tweeters! This shows the impact and relevance of teaching and research being conducted in UCLan as part of CSD, of which we are incredibly proud.

Additional Information

Contact Details

CSD Director: Professor Jack Goulding

University of Central Lancashire

Preston, PR1 2HE

Phone: 01772 89 4213

Email: JSGoulding@uclan.ac.uk

Web: www.uclan.ac.uk/csd

Related Research Groups

• Centre for Energy and Power Management

• Centre for Waste Management

Related Projects

CSD Research Environment

CSD staff are all actively engaged in numerous high profile activities, that not only reflect their esteemed standing in the broader research community, but also helps keep them at the cutting edge of scientific evolution. These activities include roles such as international academic journal editorships; journal editorial advisory boards; active membership of international conference scientific and technical committees; memberships and fellowships of learned and professional societies; expert peer reviewing invitations from industrial, private and government research funders; and expert reviewing/ witness/ consultancy roles.

The CSD recognises and fully endorses the cross-disciplinary nature of the sustainability agenda, and in recognition of this, our team of researchers and PhD students is equally multidisciplinary. This is but one characteristic of the Centre that helps us meet our aim of continually bridging sustainability activity across the whole of UCLan, through many high profile external conduits – such as above. Accordingly, our sustainability activities embrace the subject disciplines of natural sciences, design, environmental issues, engineering, social sciences, health and economics.

Excellence in Student’s Research

Not only is CSD proud of the excellence in its staff, but the recruitment of outstanding PhD students has been of equal importance in maintaining the world leading research profile of the Centre. Nurturing students to become our major research engine has been a priority for the CSD and through first class research student infrastructure and support, the Centre nurtures their skills and enables them to achieve their immediate and medium term aspirations. This is reflected in the enthusiasm and ability of our research students as evidenced for example, in their delivery of deliver research papers to the SBNE Seminar Series and the UCLan Annual Research Student Conference; presentations at major international conferences; publication of articles in academic journals; and active participation in other public delivery mechanisms.

One example of research excellence was the publication in International Journal of Construction Supply Chain Management a paper titled ‘Collaborative engagement approaches for delivering sustainable infrastructure projects in the AEC sector’. The lead author, Alaba Adetola, who published with their supervisors Professor Jack Goulding and Dr Champika Liyanage; won the best student paper award at the 6th International Engineering and Construction Conference in Egypt for the PhD work on ‘Sustainable construction: a conceptual framework for transforming policy into project level practice’.

Other exemplars include awards for the ‘Development of enhanced lifecycle assessment tool using a sustainable livelihood approach’, and ‘Critical success factors and key performance indicators in public private partnership transport’ (projects funded by the Undergraduate Research Internship Scheme).

Some of our Research Students and their Projects

• PhD Candidate, Sepehr Abrishami, Generative BIM Workspace for Maximising AEC Conceptual Design Innovation.
• PhD Candidate, Victor Oladapo Atere, Development of Measurement Metrics for Social Sustainability in Transport Projects.
• PhD Candidate Jenni Barrett, The Dynamics of Design: A model for predicting and managing the innovative capacity of built environment design teams.
• PhD Candidate, Qing Xin Chen, Study of the Impact of Quality Management System on Chinese Baby Dairy Product Industries.
• PhD Candidate, Isaiah Oluremi Durosaiye, An Interdisciplinary Approach to Support Age-friendly and Inclusive Workplace Design.
• PhD Candidate, Akanbi Olusayo Oyebanji, Development of a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) Framework for the Implementation of Sustainable Social Housing Provision (SSHP).
• PhD Candidate, Christos Pliakos, Factors Influencing ‘Ageing in Place’. A Cross-national Comparative Analysis between UK and Greece.
• PhD Candidate Renuka Thakore, A Conceptual Stakeholder Engagement Model for Housing Sustainability in England.