SBE27 Montreal Conference

Call for contributions

SBE27 Montreal is launching a call for papers on the theme “Building a Regenerative Future”. 

Regenerative: the ambition goes beyond reducing impacts. It is to design a built environment that restores what it depends on (communities, resources, ecosystems and capital) in a context where the climate and the sensitivity of local environments call for their own solutions. 

Contributions should address one or more of the following tracks:

• Regenerative infrastructure: Turning infrastructure into a bridge to nature rather than a barrier. The backbone of society, civil infrastructure is also among the works that most disturb natural environments. This track rethinks roads, bridges, railways, etc. so that they restore the environments they cross, with particular attention to northern and Arctic regions. Comparable issues elsewhere in the world are equally welcome.
• Regenerative renovation and construction: The best building is the one that already exists. This track addresses the technical, economic and regulatory challenges of renovation, which turns aging buildings into high-performance regenerative hubs: efficient envelopes and systems, heating decarbonization, change of use, heritage conservation, and the industrialization of renovation work. Regenerative techniques applied to new construction are equally welcome.
• Regenerative and circular materials: Designing regenerative materials that also emit less greenhouse gas (GHG), and that come back as a resource at the end of their first life. This track welcomes work on the industrialization of regenerative and bio-based materials, alternative binders and the valorization of industrial residues, carbon capture built into construction materials, life cycle assessment (LCA) and long-term performance, and circular approaches: reuse, design for disassembly and material passports.
• Climate change adaptation and mitigation: Adapting to new climatic conditions is sometimes the most sustainable approach. This track addresses practices that adapt the built environment to the effects of climate change (heatwaves and urban heat islands, flooding and combined sewer overflows, wildfires, freeze-thaw cycles, permafrost degradation, etc.) in order to strengthen the climate resilience and sustainability of communities, together with the associated mitigation strategies and the trade-offs between the two.
• Management, governance and digital tools: Closing the gap between intention and impact. This track focuses on the operational side of sustainability: management frameworks and tools, certifications (Envision, LEED, BREEAM and others), life cycle assessment (LCA) approaches, digital tools (BIM, digital twins, open data and interoperability), and the governance structures needed to ensure that ambitious regenerative targets survive the complexities of a project life cycle.
• Sustainable finance and business models for regeneration: Finance is the lever that allows regeneration to change scale. This track looks for the models that make a regenerative project financeable: green bonds, performance-linked loans, blended finance and catalytic public capital; renovation structures such as third-party financing, performance contracts and one-stop shops; and value drawn from carbon stored in materials and from ecosystem services. Access to capital for small players and communities is central to the track.
• Ecosystem services, urban ecology and agriculture: Buildings, as biotic actors, owe a contribution to the land they occupy. This track is devoted to design that restores local biodiversity: nitrogen cycle management, “sponge city” mechanisms at building scale, net-positive hydrological systems, greening and living soils, ecological connectivity, urban agriculture, and the quantification and valuation of the ecosystem services delivered.
• Culture, participation and co-creation: Regeneration is built together with the places people live. This track addresses approaches that bring residents, practitioners and researchers into the design process: participatory processes and living labs, co-creation and action research, the integration of culture and of local and Indigenous knowledge into architectural and urban projects, the appropriation and everyday use of spaces, occupant comfort and experience. The skills of the socio-ecological transition also have their place here.

SBE27 Montréal invites you to submit an abstract of your work, whether it involves fundamental or applied research, case studies, demonstration projects, public policy analysis or innovative practice. Proposals arising from collaboration between research, industry, the financial sector, municipalities and communities are particularly encouraged. For submission conditions and manuscript templates, please consult the IOPscience website, section “Conference Proceedings – IOPscience – Publishing Support”.

Key dates:

• Abstract submission deadline: November 15, 2026 (inclusive)
• Notification of acceptance: January 2027
• Full paper or extended abstract deadline: March 2027
• Conference: August 8 to 12, 2027
• Publication of conference proceedings: September 2027 (Only registered attendees are eligible for publication in the proceedings)

Instructions for abstract submission:

• Maximum length: 300 words (abstract only, excluding title and references)
• Language: Abstracts may be submitted in French or English
• Use the Word template available in the IOPscience website
• References: maximum 3, included in the 300-word limit