Abstract
The building industry has a major environmental impact in terms of global energy use, carbon emissions, resource use, and the production of waste. To reach ambitious international environmental goals, the building industry faces a need for large-scale change. Circular strategies for buildings include using building and materials longer through lifetime extension strategies, reuse, sharing, renovating, refurbishing, and eventually deconstructing and recycling materials. The chapter presents many specific examples of these strategies in practice. Policies are also a key driver of circularity in the building and construction industry and an overview of the policy mix is discussed with examples from the EU, which has implemented many such policies targeting the building and construction industry in particular. While there are many positive examples of circularity in the sectors, there remain challenges, and changes are needed. Regulations regarding development and demolition plans, waste, and use of buildings need to be fundamentally reconsidered in order to further enable and encourage circularity in this sector. Barriers in the reuse and market for reusable building components and materials need to be addressed. There is a need for a shift in thinking in the industry to enable the normalization of circular business models and practices. Future trends in digitalization and policies promise to further push for a more circular building sector.
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Janson, U., Richter, J.L., Milios, L., Johansson, D. (2022). Towards a Circular Building Industry. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A.M., Doni, F., Salvia, A.L. (eds) Handbook of Sustainability Science in the Future. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68074-9_148-1
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