Intrinsically Circular

High-quality reuse of buildings and construction parts, avoiding the use of raw materials and waste production to unburden the environment, is an important challenge in creating a circular building industry. It implies closing the loop between the demolition and the development phases, which demands paradigmatic changes in the way of building.

Important steps towards this are materials passports, and physical and virtual marketplaces of reusable building materials. Nevertheless, these instruments do not always efficiently promote building materials reuse. This is partly due to the fact that materials sometimes must be stored for a long time before they are purchased again, or they are not yet available on the moment building developers could use them. These and other barriers can be overcome if disassembly companies and developers work together well and in a timely manner.

In this project the partners co-create a service for integrated disassembly and design of buildings. Tools and an overarching business model will be delivered: information inventory of reusable materials; and a design tool, with environmental impact assessment estimation, to support design decisions. Design propositions for buildings with a very high proportion of recycled materials, that can be used several times as a source for new buildings, are enabled.