Matching Demolition and Construction Material Flows, an Urban Mining Case Study

• Main Authors: Teun Johannes Verhagen, Marijn Louise Sauer, Ester van der Voet, Benjamin Sprecher
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-01-01
• Series: Sustainability
• Subjects: urban mining; circular economy policy; GIS
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/2/653

The recycling of demolition waste is essential to lower the construction sectors primary material demand, responsible for 50% of the global primary material consumption. Almost all demolition waste is used as filler material for the construction of roads, preventing further reuse or recycling after this application. The built environment generates considerable annual material in-and outflows. However, there has been little discussion on the availability and further application of this potential supply of secondary materials as a replacement for primary materials. In this study, we quantify the percentage of demolition waste that can be repurposed as secondary materials in the Dutch construction sector. We analyzed the yearly building material flows for the municipality of Leiden using municipal data on demolition and construction to explore the viability of the Dutch government’s policy goal to reduce primary materials consumption by 50% before 2030. From this analysis, we find that the recycling of demolition waste has a sizable potential but just falls short of the stated policy goal. Even in a situation with more construction than demolition, there will remain a considerable mismatch in the yearly construction material demand and available supply of demolition waste for our municipal-wide case study. More importantly, the current processing of demolition waste in the Netherlands will require significant improvements to achieve this goal. New governmental policies are required to focus on maintaining material quality and allowing further use of recycled materials as buildings materials.