Abstract
Nowadays, restoration interventions that aim for minimum environmental impact are conceived for recent buildings. Greenhouse gas emissions are reduced using criteria met within a life-cycle analysis, while energy saving is achieved with cost-effective retrofitting actions that secure higher benefits in terms of comfort. However, conservation, restoration and retrofitting interventions in historic buildings do not have the same objectives as in modern buildings. Additional requirements have to be followed, such as the use of materials compatible with the original and the preservation of authenticity to ensure historic, artistic, cultural and social values over time. The paper presents a systematic review—at the intersection between environmental sustainability and conservation—of the state of the art of current methodological approaches applied in the sustainable refurbishment of historic buildings. It identifies research gaps in the field and highlights the paradox seen in the Scandinavian countries that are models in applying environmentally sustainable policies but still poor in integrating preservation issues.
Highlights
Nowadays, restoration interventions that aim for minimum environmental impact are conceived for recent buildings
It highlights the current situation created in the Scandinavian countries that are meritorious, and a model in applying sustainable policies that are poor when it comes to integrating preservation issues
This review offers insights into the state of knowledge on sustainable refurbishment of historic building (HB) and reports how these topics are being explored globally
Summary
Identification and counting of existing research publications in the field of sustainable refurbishment of historic buildings was done using the online Elsevier database, Scopus. When one document was judged to belong to more than one category, it was assigned to the most relevant field by the authors From these two main driving factors (orange colour—Figure 1), more precise categories of contents were recognized (green colour in Figure 1) and the classes of environmental (impact) and refurbishment (process), the focus of our paper, were selected for further review. This deep review was the third and last level of analysis, i.e., the content’s characteristics.
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