Sustainable building renovation: Proposals for a research agenda

The purpose of this paper is to identify research gaps and potential new topics for research in relation to the management of sustainable building renovation. The paper is based on a literature review of current research on sustainable building renovation. It analyses the research to pinpoint main focus areas and strengths, as well as identifying areas of weakness and research gaps, which are seen as potential topics for new research.

The emphasis is on comprehensive renovation projects of buildings with a holistic sustainability approach. The analysis focuses on the management and process aspects in relation to planning, decision-making, conducting, and evaluating renovation projects. The result is a proposal for new research topics for sustainable building renovation.

The current research shows a dominating focus on developing new tools for design support and measuring environmental performance, while there is limited research on developing strategies for renovation and improving the productivity of renovation processes. Out of the three pillars of sustainability, social sustainability is the least defined, and there is a need to develop methods to make a holistic prioritization and evaluation of all aspects of sustainability.