Is the end of a building’s life actually an opportunity? This research reframes “deconstruction” as the backbone of a circular urban future. While traditional demolition is fast and cheap, it hides a massive environmental cost in the form of landfill waste and lost resources.
By adopting a strategy of Selective Dismantlement, the construction industry can recover valuable materials for immediate reuse or repurposing.
The study proposes a set of universal principles that apply to any construction system, emphasizing that the potential for a building to be “recycled” is decided the moment it is designed.
For modern cities to meet their sustainability goals, we must move beyond the “linear” model of consumption and start viewing our built environment as a rotating inventory of materials. This paper provides the foundational “how-to” for turning that vision into a standard industrial practice.
Learn more about this study here: https://doi.org/10.3390/app11030939
Reference
Bertino, G., Kisser, J., Zeilinger, J., Langergraber, G., Fischer, T., & Österreicher, D. (2021). Fundamentals of Building Deconstruction as a Circular Economy Strategy for the Reuse of Construction Materials. Applied Sciences, 11(3), 939