Accelerating the Circular Economy Transition: A Construction Value Chain-Structured Portfolio of Strategies and Implementation Insights
Publication: Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 150, Issue 8
Abstract
Despite the increasing recognition of the potential of Circular Economy (CE) strategies, their effective application to decarbonize the construction value chain faces multiple challenges. Ambiguity surrounding CE, stemming from a lack of clarity on actionable strategies, is a common concern. Existing studies lack a holistic approach for systematically integrating CE principles throughout the construction value chain, resulting in a scarcity of information on how to practically adopt CE within projects. This research aims to accelerate CE adoption by creating a value chain-structured portfolio of CE strategies and analyzing the implementation of such strategies in actual projects. To this end, a portfolio of CE strategies was compiled in a value chain-based-structure, which was evaluated against 71 US-based projects of exemplary sustainability criteria to scrutinize their successful implementation. Additionally, the study examined the interconnections and network dynamics among these strategies through association rule mining, network, and statistical analysis techniques. Results revealed a pronounced focus on strategies within the design, construction, and end-of-life value chain phases, with significant gaps existing in areas related to project financing, planning, logistics, property market, and operations. “Requiring sustainability certifications, standards, or labels” emerged as the most pivotal strategy in terms of frequency and number of associations, highlighting owners’ significant role in CE transition. This study contributes to the body of knowledge by providing practical guidance and insights for industry practitioners in terms of actionable CE strategies and their state of implementation, ultimately fostering a more sustainably built environment.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Data Availability Statement
Some or all data, models, or code that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Acknowledgments
This work was partially supported by the Missouri University of Science and Technology’s Kummer Institute for Student Success, Research and Economic Development through the Kummer Innovation and Entrepreneurship Doctoral Fellowship.
References
Abdul Nabi, M., A. Elsayegh, and I. H. El-adaway. 2023. “Understanding collaboration requirements for modular construction and their cascading failure impact on project performance.” J. Manage. Eng. 39 (6): 04023043. https://doi.org/10.1061/JMENEA.MEENG-5440.
Abotaleb, I. S., and I. H. El-adaway. 2019. “A network-based methodology for quantitative knowledge gap identification in construction simulation and modeling research.” In Proc., ASCE Int. Conf. on Computing in Civil Engineering 2019, 522–529. Reston, VA: ASCE.
Adams, K. T., M. Osmani, T. Thorpe, and J. Thornback. 2017. “Circular economy in construction: Current awareness, challenges and enablers.” In Vol. 170 of Proc., Institution of Civil Engineers-Waste and Resource Management, 15–24. London: Thomas Telford. https://doi.org/10.1680/jwarm.16.00011.
Agrawal, R., and R. Srikant. 1994. “Fast algorithms for mining association rules.” In Proc., 20th Int. Conf. Very Large Data Bases VLDB, 487–499. New York: Association for Computing Machinery.
Ahmed, M. O., and I. H. El-adaway. 2023. “Data-driven analysis of construction bidding stage–Related causes of disputes.” J. Manage. Eng. 39 (5): 04023026. https://doi.org/10.1061/JMENEA.MEENG-5426.
AIA (American Institute of Architects). 2023a. “AIA COTE top ten awards.” Accessed March 1, 2023. https://www.aia.org/awards/7301-cote-top-ten-awards.
AIA (American Institute of Architects). 2023b. “AIA-CLF embodied carbon toolkit for architects.” Accessed January 6, 2023. https://www.aia.org/resources/6445061-aia-clf-embodied-carbon-toolkit-for-archit.
Akhimien, N. G., E. Latif, and S. S. Hou. 2021. “Application of circular economy principles in buildings: A systematic review.” J. Build. Eng. 38 (Jun): 102041. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jobe.2020.102041.
ARUP and EMF (Arup and Ellen MacArthur Foundation). 2018. “From principles to practices: First steps towards a circular built environment [white paper].” London: Arup & Ellen MacArthur Foundation.
ARUP and EMF (Arup and Ellen MacArthur Foundation). 2023. “Circular building toolkit.” Accessed January 3, 2023. https://ce-toolkit.dhub.arup.com/.
Assaad, R. H., I. H. El-adaway, M. Hastak, and K. LaScola Needy. 2022. “The impact of offsite construction on the workforce: Required skillset and prioritization of training needs.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 148 (7): 04022056. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0002314.
Bastian, M., S. Heymann, and M. Jacomy. 2009. “Gephi: An open source software for exploring and manipulating networks.” In Vol. 3 of Proc., Int. AAAI Conf. on Web and Social Media, 361–362. Washington, DC: Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence. https://doi.org/10.1609/icwsm.v3i1.13937.
Cabello, A. T., M. Martínez-Rojas, J. A. Carrillo-Castrillo, and J. C. Rubio-Romero. 2021. “Occupational accident analysis according to professionals of different construction phases using association rules.” Saf. Sci. 144 (Dec): 105457. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssci.2021.105457.
Chammout, B., M. O. Ahmed, I. El-adaway, and W. Lieser. 2024. “A holistic approach to exploring the root factors of work zone accidents.” J. Manage. Eng. 40 (1): 04023062. https://doi.org/10.1061/JMENEA.MEENG-5729.
Chinowsky, P., and J. E. Taylor. 2012. “Networks in engineering: An emerging approach to project organization studies.” Eng. Project Organ. J. 2 (1–2): 15–26. https://doi.org/10.1080/21573727.2011.635647.
CLF (Carbon Leadership Forum). 2023. “Embodied carbon policy toolkit.” Accessed January 3, 2023. https://carbonleadershipforum.org/clf-policy-toolkit/.
Costa, S., M. S. Carvalho, C. Pimentel, and C. Duarte. 2023. “A systematic literature review and conceptual framework of construction industrialization.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 149 (2): 03122013. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0002410.
Cruz Rios, F., D. Grau, and M. Bilec. 2021. “Barriers and enablers to circular building design in the US: An empirical study.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 147 (10): 04021117. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0002109.
Dewagoda, K. G., S. T. Ng, and J. Chen. 2022. “Driving systematic circular economy implementation in the construction industry: A construction value chain perspective.” J. Cleaner Prod. 381 (Dec): 135197. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2022.135197.
Ding, L., T. Wang, and P. Chan. 2023. “Forward and reverse logistics for circular economy in construction: A systematic literature review.” J. Cleaner Prod. 388 (Feb): 135981. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2023.135981.
Eissa, R., M. S. Eid, and E. Elbeltagi. 2021. “Current applications of game theory in construction engineering and management research: A social network analysis approach.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 147 (7): 04021066. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0002085.
Eissa, R., and I. H. El-adaway. 2024. “Circular economy policies for decarbonization of US commercial building stocks: Data integration and system dynamics coflow modeling approach.” J. Manage. Eng. 40 (2): 04024003. https://doi.org/10.1061/JMENEA.MEENG-5824.
El-adaway, I. H., G. G. Ali, R. Eissa, M. Abdul Nabi, M. O. Ahmed, T. Elbashbishy, and R. Khalef. 2023. “Construction management and economics 40th anniversary: Investigating knowledge structure and evolution of research trends.” Construct. Manage. Econ. 41 (4): 338–360. https://doi.org/10.1080/01446193.2022.2164598.
Ellen MacArthur Foundation. 2018. Reimagining our buildings and spaces for a circular economy. Chicago: Ellen MacArthur Foundation.
Gallego-Schmid, A., H. M. Chen, M. Sharmina, and J. M. F. Mendoza. 2020. “Links between circular economy and climate change mitigation in the built environment.” J. Cleaner Prod. 260 (Jul): 121115. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.121115.
GBCI (Green Business Certification Inc.). 2023. “About TRUE.” Accessed January 20, 2023. https://www.gbci.org/about-true.
Genga, L., L. Allodi, and N. Zannone. 2022. “Association rule mining meets regression analysis: An automated approach to unveil systematic biases in decision-making processes.” J. Cybersecur. Privacy 2 (1): 191–219. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcp2010011.
Guerra, B. C., and F. Leite. 2021. “Circular economy in the construction industry: An overview of United States stakeholders’ awareness, major challenges, and enablers.” Resour. Conserv. Recycl. 170 (Jul): 105617. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2021.105617.
Guerra, B. C., S. Shahi, A. Mollaei, N. Skaf, O. Weber, F. Leite, and C. Haas. 2021. “Circular economy applications in the construction industry: A global scan of trends and opportunities.” J. Cleaner Prod. 324 (Nov): 129125. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.129125.
Guevara, J., J. Salazar, and M. J. Garvin. 2020. “Social network analysis of road PPP equity markets in Canada, Chile, and the United States.” J. Manage. Eng. 36 (5): 04020058. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)ME.1943-5479.0000830.
Hughes, E. 2019. “How LEED v4.1 addresses embodied carbon.” Accessed May 29, 2019. https://www.usgbc.org/articles/how-leed-v41-addresses-embodied-carbon.
IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). 2022. Climate change 2022: Impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Kaulkar, S., L. Vinodh, and P. Thompson. 2018. “Initial analysis of multivariate factors for prediction of shark presence and attacks on the coast of North Carolina.” In Proc., Foundations of Intelligent Systems: 24th Int. Symp., ISMIS 2018, Limassol, Cyprus, 426–435. Berlin: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01851-1_41.
Khalef, R., and I. H. El-adaway. 2023. “Identifying design-build decision-making factors and providing future research guidelines: Social network and association rule analysis.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 149 (1): 04022151. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0002431.
Kluyver, T., et al. 2016. “Jupyter notebooks–A publishing format for reproducible computational workflows.” In Positioning and power in academic publishing: Players, agents and agendas, edited by F. Loizides and B. Scmidt, 87–90. Amsterdam, Netherlands: IOS Press. https://doi.org/10.3233/978-1-61499-649-1-87.
Lin, J., Y. Cai, and Q. Li. 2023. “Development of safety training in construction: Literature review, scientometric analysis, and meta-analysis.” J. Manage. Eng. 39 (6): 03123002. https://doi.org/10.1061/JMENEA.MEENG-5445.
Lu, W., J. Xu, and J. Söderlund. 2020. “Exploring the effects of building information modeling on projects: Longitudinal social network analysis.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 146 (5): 04020037. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0001823.
Mahpour, A. 2018. “Prioritizing barriers to adopt circular economy in construction and demolition waste management.” Resour. Conserv. Recycl. 134 (Jul): 216–227. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2018.01.026.
Maphosa, M., and V. Maphosa. 2020. “Educational data mining in higher education in sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic literature review and research agenda.” In Proc., 2nd Int. Conf. on Intelligent and Innovative Computing Applications, 1–7. New York: Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/3415088.3415096.
Masoomy, H., V. Adami, and M. N. Najafi. 2023. “Relation between the degree and betweenness centrality distribution in complex networks.” Phys. Rev. E 107 (4): 044303. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.107.044303.
Microsoft. 2021. “Reducing embodied carbon in construction: An inside look into how microsoft is reducing emissions during the construction of new buildings and datacenters [white paper].” Washington, DC: Microsoft Corporation.
Mostofi, F., O. B. Tokdemir, and V. Toğan. 2023. “Comprehensive root cause analysis of construction defects using semisupervised graph representation learning.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 149 (9): 04023079. https://doi.org/10.1061/JCEMD4.COENG-13435.
Nußholz, J., S. Çetin, L. Eberhardt, C. De Wolf, and N. Bocken. 2023. “From circular strategies to actions: 65 European circular building cases and their decarbonisation potential.” Resour. Conserv. Recycl. Adv. 17 (May): 200130. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rcradv.2023.200130.
Ossio, F., C. Salinas, and H. Hernández. 2023. “Circular economy in the built environment: A systematic literature review and definition of the circular construction concept.” J. Cleaner Prod. 7 (Jun): 137738. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2023.137738.
Palinkas, L. A., S. M. Horwitz, C. A. Green, J. P. Wisdom, N. Duan, and K. Hoagwood. 2015. “Purposeful sampling for qualitative data collection and analysis in mixed method implementation research.” Adm. Policy Mental Health Mental Health Serv. Res. 42 (Sep): 533–544. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10488-013-0528-y.
Peña, L. V. D. L., S. E. Taelman, N. Préat, L. Boone, K. Van der Biest, M. Custódio, S. H. Lucas, G. Everaert, and J. Dewulf. 2022. “Towards a comprehensive sustainability methodology to assess anthropogenic impacts on ecosystems: Review of the integration of life cycle assessment, environmental risk assessment and ecosystem services assessment.” Sci. Total Environ. 808 (Feb): 152125. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.152125.
PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses). 2023. “PRISMA flow diagram.” Accessed January 2, 2023. http://prisma-statement.org/prismastatement/flowdiagram.aspx.
Rahman, M. M., C. F. Ahmed, and C. Kai-Sang Leung. 2018. “Mining weighted frequent sequences in uncertain databases.” Inf. Sci. 479 (Apr): 76–100. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ins.2018.11.026.
Raschka, S. 2018. “MLxtend: Providing machine learning and data science utilities and extensions to Python’s scientific computing stack.” J. Open Source Software 3 (24): 638. https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.00638.
Rethlefsen, M. L., S. Kirtley, S. Waffenschmidt, A. P. Ayala, D. Moher, M. J. Page, and J. B. Koffel. 2021. “PRISMA-S: An extension to the PRISMA statement for reporting literature searches in systematic reviews.” Syst. Rev. 10 (Dec): 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13643-020-01542-z.
Rivera-Perez, J. J., S. Kang, W. Sayeh, J. Garcia-Mainieri, I. L. Al-Qadi, and H. Ozer. 2022. “Statistical analysis of hot-mix asphalt pay for performance versus quality control for performance.” J. Transp. Eng. Part B: Pavements 148 (2): 04022016. https://doi.org/10.1061/JPEODX.0000365.
Salih, F., R. Eissa, and I. H. El-adaway. 2024. “Data-driven analysis of progressive design build in water and wastewater infrastructure projects.” J. Constr. Eng. Manage. 150 (1): 04023149. https://doi.org/10.1061/JCEMD4.COENG-13824.
SEI (Structural Engineering Institute). 2023. “Achieving net zero embodied carbon in structural materials by 2050.” ASCE Structural Engineering Institute Sustainability Committee. Accessed January 3, 2023. https://seisustainability.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/how-to-get-to-zero-200525.pdf.
Senaratne, S., N. Rodrigo, L. M. Almeida, S. Perera, and X. Jin. 2023. “Systematic review on stakeholder collaboration for a circular built environment: Current research trends, gaps and future directions.” Resour. Conserv. Recyl. Adv. 19 (Nov): 200169. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rcradv.2023.200169.
Spreafico, C. 2022. “An analysis of design strategies for circular economy through life cycle assessment.” Environ. Monit. Assess. 194 (3): 180. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-022-09803-1.
Tirelli, D., and D. Besana. 2023. “Moving toward net zero carbon buildings to face Global Warming: A narrative review.” Buildings 13 (3): 684. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings13030684.
UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme). 2021. Catalysing science-based policy action on sustainable consumption and production—The value-chain approach & its application to food, construction and textiles. Nairobi, Kenya: UNEP.
USGBC (US Green Building Council). 2023. “Case studies.” Accessed March 10, 2023. https://www.usgbc.org/resources?Education+Resources=%5B%22LEED+case+studies%22%5D.
Van Bueren, B. J., U. Iyer-Raniga, M. A. Leenders, and K. Argus. 2021. “Comprehensiveness of circular economy assessments of regions: A systematic review at the macro-level.” Environ. Res. Lett. 16 (10): 103001. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac209c.
Van Rossum, G., and F. L. Drake. 1995. Python reference manual, 1–52. Amsterdam, Netherlands: Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica.
Virtanen, P., et al. 2020. “SciPy 1.0: Fundamental algorithms for scientific computing in Python.” Nat. Methods 17 (3): 261–272. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41592-019-0686-2.
Weng, C. H. 2016. “Identifying association rules of specific later-marketed products.” Appl. Soft Comput. 38 (Jan): 518–529. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.asoc.2015.09.047.
Workentin, M., M. Castro Arteaga, A. K. M. Alamgir, and C. F. Kupka. 2022. PRISMA statement and Cochrane reviews: Striving to improve quality and validity of systematic reviews. Truro, NS: Dalhousie Univ.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 150 • Issue 8 • August 2024
Copyright
© 2024 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Sep 20, 2023
Accepted: Feb 20, 2024
Published online: May 21, 2024
Published in print: Aug 1, 2024
Discussion open until: Oct 21, 2024
ASCE Technical Topics:
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.