Copyright Publishing Notice

Copyright Notice

This notice defines the formal copyright, licensing, and reuse terms for all scholarly content published in Insights in Sustainable Engineering Practices (ISEP) , ensuring legal transparency and full compliance with international open-access best practices while respecting the applied and solution-oriented nature of sustainable engineering research.

1. Copyright Ownership
Authors retain the copyright of their original research and scholarly contributions. By submitting to and publishing with ISEP, authors grant the journal a non-exclusive, irrevocable license to publish, reproduce, distribute, and archive the definitive version of the work in all formats and media under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

2. Open Access Licensing
To maximize the dissemination and application of sustainable engineering research, each article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) : https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. This license grants any user the worldwide, royalty-free right to:

  • Share – copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format.

  • Adapt – remix, transform, translate, and build upon the material for any purpose, including commercial and educational uses.

These permissions are granted subject to one condition: proper attribution. Users must:

  • Credit the author(s) and cite Insights in Sustainable Engineering Practices (ISEP) as the original source of publication.

  • Provide a hyperlink to the CC BY 4.0 license.

  • Clearly indicate if the original work has been modified.

3. Rights and Responsibilities

  • Author Rights and Self-Archiving: Authors are expressly permitted and encouraged to deposit the final published PDF (version of record) in institutional repositories, subject repositories, preprint servers, personal websites, and academic social networks including ResearchGate (https://www.researchgate.net/) and Google Scholar (https://scholar.google.com/). Authors may reuse their own figures, tables, datasets, and text in future publications, grant applications, patent filings, presentations, theses, or teaching materials without obtaining further permission, provided the original ISEP publication is appropriately cited.

  • Third-Party Content: Authors are solely responsible for obtaining written permission from the copyright holder for any third-party material included in their manuscript. This includes, but is not limited to: images, illustrations, photographs, graphs, charts, engineering diagrams, extended quotations, proprietary datasets, and any other copyrighted material not created by the author. Proof of permission must be provided to the editorial office upon request. Proper attribution must accompany all reused content.

  • Originality and Plagiarism Prevention: ISEP accepts for publication only original materials that have not been published before and have not been submitted elsewhere. Authors must ensure their submission is original and all sources must be properly cited; plagiarism in any form is unacceptable. The journal follows a rigorous peer review process and adheres to the highest standards of academic excellence and ethical publishing practices.

  • Publisher Archiving and Preservation: Insights in Sustainable Engineering Practices (ISEP) ensures the long-term preservation and perpetual accessibility of all published content through participation in trusted digital preservation networks. These include:

These systems create distributed archives among participating libraries worldwide, guaranteeing that all content remains permanently available to the sustainable engineering research community even in the event the journal ceases publication.

4. Ethical Standards and Scholarly Integrity

Authors must confirm that their submission is original, has not been published elsewhere, and is not under simultaneous consideration by another publication. Manuscripts must be free from plagiarism, data fabrication, or any other unethical practices. Insights in Sustainable Engineering Practices (ISEP) adheres to the principles, policies, and flowcharts of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) : https://publicationethics.org. The journal also encourages adherence to discipline-specific guidelines and standards, including:

Any allegations of plagiarism, copyright infringement, data fabrication, ethical approval violations, or other misconduct will be investigated promptly and thoroughly in accordance with COPE guidelines.

5. Research Ethics and Compliance

  • Human Subjects Research: For research involving human subjects, surveys, or interviews (common in sustainable engineering studies addressing social dimensions), authors must confirm that the study was conducted in accordance with relevant ethical guidelines and that informed consent was obtained where appropriate. A statement of ethical approval from an appropriate institutional review board or ethics committee must be included in the manuscript where applicable.

  • Environmental and Field Research: For research involving field studies, environmental sampling, or work in protected areas, authors must confirm that all necessary permits and permissions were obtained from relevant authorities and that the research complied with local, national, and international environmental regulations.

  • Data Availability and Transparency: Authors are strongly encouraged to make their underlying data, code, and materials openly available in recognized repositories or through supplementary files to support verification, replication, and real-world application of sustainable engineering solutions, in accordance with the FAIR Data Principles. A data availability statement should be included in all manuscripts.

  • Conflict of Interest: Authors must declare any potential conflicts of interest, including financial, professional, or personal relationships that could influence the research or its interpretation. This includes funding sources, consulting relationships, or affiliations with organizations mentioned in the research.

  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) Usage: Authors must disclose any use of artificial intelligence or large language models in the preparation of their manuscript, including in writing, data analysis, or figure generation, in accordance with the journal's AI policy and COPE guidance. AI tools cannot be listed as authors.

6. Commercial Use

The CC BY 4.0 license permits commercial use of published content without requiring additional permission from the publisher or authors, as long as proper attribution is provided. This includes use by corporations, consulting firms, and other commercial entities. Users engaging in commercial use must still comply with the attribution requirements of the license.

7. Policy Updates

ISEP reserves the right to update this copyright and licensing policy as standards of publishing, copyright legislation, and open access practices evolve. All amendments will be clearly published on the journal's webpage.