The Relationship between Construction and Demolition Waste Minimisation and Sustainable Construction

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6463-720-5_4How to use a DOI?

Keywords

C&D Waste; C&D Waste Minimisation Approaches; Waste Minimisation Framework

Abstract

Increasing urbanisation has become a global environmental concern, as half of the extracted natural resources are used for building construction. In addition, the factual claims made on socio-economic benefits achieved through Construction & Demolition (C&D) waste minimisation approaches are yet to be fully explored. Further, the majority’s vested interest has neglected the life cycle approach for waste minimisation. Hence, this research provides a review of literature on C&D waste minimisation, considering cradle to cradle thinking to advocate Sustainable Construction. This research highlighted the state of the art of C&D waste minimisation approaches worldwide, including factors influencing waste generation, challenges in waste minimisation, and provides a conceptual waste minimisation framework. The framework identified key waste minimisation challenges over the project’s life cycle. Some of the challenges are: poor building standards; lack of waste sorting and limited secondary market. Subsequently, the framework provides remedy(ies), including but not limited to the use of design to dissemble approach, Waste management and Resource recovery plan, use of multiple bins and setting technical standards for recycled materials. The waste minimisation framework attempts to promote a circular economy in building construction and help academics and industry practitioners to herald a new era of research in sustainable construction. Further, this research is an attempt to contribute to United Nations’s Sustainable Development Goal 12 that ensures sustainable consumption of resources by achieving the Target 12.5 (substantially reduce waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling and reuse).

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Rohit Gade
AU  - Jeff Seadon
AU  - Mani Poshdar
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/06/30
TI  - The Relationship between Construction and Demolition Waste Minimisation and Sustainable Construction
BT  - Proceedings of the Smart Sustainable Development Conference 2025 (SSD 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 34
EP  - 45
SN  - 3005-155X
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-720-5_4
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6463-720-5_4
ID  - Gade2025
ER  -