In order to ensure China, a populous country, to develop in a sustainable way, it is an urgent task to disseminate the concept of sustainability and put it into practice for urban construction. However, it is impossible for China to simply copy the experiences of developed countries, since China has the higher population and building density and less availability of reusable energy per square meter floor area. Therefore, it is necessary to develop the sustainable building technologies applicable to various climate regions, economic conditions, and residential customs in China, as well as sustainable to the most occupants and owners. Based on an introduction of the current situation of the development of construction industry and the energy consumption of buildings in China, this paper analyses the requirements, characteristics, standards for sustainable housing and urban construction, and recommends series of technical approaches along with different phases of sustainable design and construction, which strengthen a good cooperation among researchers, designers and constructors of different majors including architecture, planning, building physics, building services, and so on. Moreover, some issues, which need further research and especially handling, are pointed out along with the recommendations. Finally, policy issue related with the sustainable development of urban construction in China is discussed. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.