Abstract
The synergy between Distributed Ledger Technologies, like blockchain technology and circular economy, can lead to economic, environmental, and social sustainability through protecting natural resources, optimizing processes, fostering system effectiveness, designing out waste, and also providing job opportunities. Nevertheless, industries and their supply chain need to consider several requirements for blockchain implementation to realize a circular economy. To achieve this goal, requirements for implementing blockchain technology in construction supply chain were prioritized based on circular economy attributes. For multiple-criteria decision analysis and making our preference decision, we employed the new-founded multi-attribute decision-making (MADM) method, the “Fuzzy Ordinal Priority Approach (Fuzzy OPA).” Under uncertainty conditions, this method can determine fuzzy weights of circular economy attributes and fuzzy scores of blockchain requirements using linguistic variables. The results obtained from the case study show that three high-ranked requirements for implementing blockchain are (1) developing circular economy attributes on platforms, (2) intra-organizational considerations, and (3) technological requirements and collaboration infrastructure. To discuss the circular economy, we used the ReSOLVE framework, consisting of six attributes “Regenerate, Share, Optimize, Loop, Virtualize, and Exchange.” According to research findings, blockchain implementation can move the construction industry toward a circular economy through (1) regenerating environment, (2) optimizing systems performance, and (3) looping and circulating products.
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Abbreviations
- CE:
-
Circular economy
- DLT:
-
Distributed ledger technology
- Fuzzy OPA:
-
Fuzzy ordinal priority approach
- MADM:
-
Multi-attribute decision-making
- ReSOLVE:
-
Regenerate, share, optimize, loop, virtualize, and exchange
- TFN:
-
Triangular fuzzy number
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank the editor and the anonymous reviewers for their important suggestions. More information regarding the Ordinal Priority Approach (OPA) can be found at www.ordinalpriorityapproach.com.
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This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. [72171048 and 71771052].
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MS contributed to conceptualization, methodology, software, and writing—original draft. AM contributed to conceptualization, methodology, software, and writing—original draft, review, and editing. XD* contributed to validation, writing (review and editing), managing all communications, and supervision. XL contributed to review, validation, and consultation.
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Sadeghi, M., Mahmoudi, A., Deng, X. et al. Prioritizing requirements for implementing blockchain technology in construction supply chain based on circular economy: Fuzzy Ordinal Priority Approach. Int. J. Environ. Sci. Technol. 20, 4991–5012 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-022-04298-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13762-022-04298-2