TOWARDS THE BEST CIRCULARITY ASSESSMENT METHODS FOR BUILDINGS

Paula Martin-Goñi; Oriol Paris-Viviana; Oriol Pons-Valladares

Abstract:

At present, it is commonly accepted that our economy requires to return to a circular system, similar to some pre-industrialized economies though, this time, rushed by environmental and social negative impacts, rather than economic constrains. After decades of circularity assessments of buildings, the construction sector still lacks specialized tools that allow agile assessment of architectural elements. Up to now, the related reviews indicate that life cycle assessment has been the most used methodology. This is probably because it was the closest tool to the topic. Nevertheless, at this moment there are many other circularity assessment approaches available, for instance the standard ISO 59020:2024, which defines a rigorous open methodology for any sector and combinable to other environmental assessment tools. There are also numerous tools specialized on buildings. Some allow agile evaluations such as the European framework for sustainable buildings Level(s). Others present a more case study point of view, like the Detail edition Manual of recycling, while many research papers develop particular methodologies. The present paper reviews these methods in order to draw initial conclusions for the future development of novel agile and rigorous circularity assessment tools for specific case studies. This research paper is part of the project "Waste-based Intelligent Solar-control-devices for Envelope Refurbishment" starts, of "Ecological Transition and Digital Transition Projects" of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN) with reference TED2021-130155B-I00, funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Union "NextGenerationEU"/PRTR.