In recent times, smart cities and sustainable development have drawn significant research attention. Among developed and developing countries, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has been at the forefront in becoming an incubator for smart cities; in particular, it has placed some efforts in the education sector by transforming the traditional campus into a Smart Campus. As the term Smart Campus attracts professionals and academics from multiple disciplines, and the technology keeps intervening in every aspect of life, it becomes inevitable for the Smart Campus to take place and deploy the future vision of smart cities. As a first step to achieve this vision, it is very important to develop a clear understanding of what is a Smart Campus. To date, there is still no clear perception of what a Smart Campus would look like, or what are the main components that can form a Smart Campus. Therefore, the objective of this research is to use the set of comprehensive criteria to identify what it is perceived to be a Smart Campus and evaluate these criteria from the stakeholders’ perception. The main criteria are defined from the literature review, and a case study is conducted on the American University of Sharjah campus stakeholders (faculty, students, management, and Information Technology (IT)) to assess the designated criteria. This exploratory research relies on both qualitative and quantitative methods to perform the analysis, taking into consideration the perceptions of students, faculty, and IT service providers. Finally, having defined and evaluated the criteria that underpin the Smart Campus framework, a set of recommendations are drawn to guide the utilization of a Smart Campus within higher education settings. This research opens the doors for future studies to gain a deeper insight into the type of decisions that need to be made to transform a traditional campus to a Smart Campus.

Carbon emissions, being hazardous, are triggering social concerns which have led to the creation of international treaties to address climate change. Similarly, the United Kingdom under the Climate Change Act (2008) has committed to reducing its greenhouse gas emission by at least 80% over 1990 levels by 2050. However, being the oldest member of the EU states (before Brexit), the UK has the oldest housing stock, which contributes to 45% of its carbon emissions due to the older dwellings. To address this issue low carbon retrofitting is needed. Therefore, this paper seeks to investigate the barriers and enablers to energy efficiency retrofitting in social housing in London, UK based on the perception of experts employed in National and construction companies with an experience that ranges between 6 to 16 years. Initial literature suggested that the problem of energy efficiency retrofitting in the general building stock has been addressed, however little has been reported on its application to social housing. This paper, therefore, groups the barriers and enablers into seven categories that include: financial matters, Technical, IT, Government policy and regulation, social factors (including awareness of the energy efficiency agenda), quality of workmanship and disruption to residents, using literature review, interviews and surveys with key stakeholders within the housing sector, and draws recommendations to enable effective and efficient retrofitting for social housing projects.

The advancement in technologies in the education sector has improved living standards and acts as a sustaining factor for future development. Recently, the integration of technologies into the campus to transform it into a Smart Campus has experienced exponential growth in interest from researchers. Though various definitions of the concept of ‘Smart Campus’ have been proposed, the integration of the end users’ perception is always lacking in the concept. This study, therefore, intends to build on the theory to classify the most significant criteria that underpin the ‘Smart Campus’ by considering the institute’s stakeholders’ perceptions. A multi-step methodological approach is adopted to develop a decision support tool that allows the decision makers to invest in the optimum solution to transform a traditional campus into a smart campus. The study initially looks into the criteria and sub-criteria from the literature that defines a ‘Smart Campus’. Secondly, a survey was conducted by targeting a sample of students, faculty, administrative staff, and IT support personnel from a leading institute in the UAE region as a single case study. Thirdly, an AHP analysis was performed among different stakeholders. The findings suggested that there exists a consensus among the perception of a diverse group of participants who perceive smart security and safety, campus navigation, and adaptive learning as the most important criteria and applications to transform the traditional campus into a smart campus. Finally, the decision support tool development on the Utility function model allows the decision makers, i.e., Network Managers, IT Managers, Systems and Cloud Managers, and Senior Managers from the Finance departments, to make informed and strategic decisions in terms of the optimum solution for the transformation from a traditional campus to a smart campus.

Purpose: Emergency preparedness (EP) is one of the crucial phases of the disaster management cycle for the built environment. The body of knowledge, therefore, reports on different preparedness standards adopted by developed countries such as the United Kingdom (UK), the United States of America (USA), Canada, Japan and Australia. Other countries, however, such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) (in the absence of its preparedness framework), have long adapted the UK preparedness standards. This has called for this study to investigate the state of EP practices in the UAE to identify the limitations and challenges it has been facing during its preparedness phase when adopting the UK preparedness standards.Design/methodology/approach: Qualitative methods of data collection and documentation with the content analysis were adopted to identify the barriers faced by the preparedness phase of emergency management (EM) in the UAE. A Pilot study was therefore conducted to validate eight key elements of the EP phase identified from the literature. The state of EP phase and the extent to which the eight key elements of EP elements were practiced and the barriers in their implementation in the UAE were explored through interviews at federal (National Crisis and Emergency Management Authority) and local levels (local team of crisis and emergency management).Findings: The study identified eight key elements of the EP phase and the associated barriers related to their implementation in the UAE. The barriers were ranked based on their severity by interviewing experts at both federal and local levels.Practical implications: This paper addresses the need to investigate the state of the EP phase, its key elements and the barriers faced during its implementation in the UAE.Originality/value: Due to the absence of any EP frameworks or systems in the UAE, this paper aims to validate the EP elements identified by adopting a qualitative approach.

Sustainability has gained popularity and importance around the globe due to the ever-increasing effects of climate change and global warming on Earth. As of the 21st century, human endeavour has caused an enormous amount of damage to the environmental ecological system. Among which, one of the major contributors to the increase in the environmental issues and CO2 emissions are the conventional sources of energy, especially in the built environment. Globally, the built environment accounts for 12 percent of the world’s drinkable water, 40 percent of energy wastage and 35 percent of scarce natural resources, which in turn produces 40 percent of the total global carbon emission. Among which are educational buildings which tend to be a major contributor (as most of these facilities are old and conventionally built in the mid-1900s) Thus, with the education sector being an essential part of society, it becomes important to determine the energy performance and carbon footprint of these buildings. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) vision 2021 highlights the country's approach to the importance of providing the best education and adopting sustainable environmental infrastructure. Therefore, this study adopts a methodological approach based on semi-structured interviews and surveys, in order to compare the energy performance of three educational buildings within Higher Education establishments in the UAE as a case study. The study also evaluates the end user’s awareness of the importance of sustainable practices in the buildings and their preference for these buildings. The findings of this study conclude that Net Zero Energy Buildings (NZEBs) are the most efficient buildings in terms of energy performance, carbon consumption and heat generated. Therefore, it is important that the integration of these types of buildings is considered in educational establishments.