The climate is changing, that is the problem. So, what is common between construction and circle economy/sustainable development? Look here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XYbqLbeiL8
How construction or other engineering can support sustainable development?
Development can be called the sum of our products and projects, i.e. our application of technology. In these applications engineers carry out, influence or decide the options evaluated, the decision-making criteria, the decision and the detailed design and implementation/production.
For development to become “sustainable”, engineers must incorporate “sustainability” into all our planning and engineering of products and projects. Technology is neither good nor bad in itself – how we choose to apply it determines whether a good balance is achieved.
Engineering integrates with all aspects of society; it takes concepts from math and sciences and puts them into context through social and economic considerations before implementing them as tangible outcomes in society. It is essential that construction engineering understands social and environmental constraints and does not just conform to economic necessities. The purely business influence has been the paradigm norm of construction engineering, which has led to the problems outlined above.
Bill Kelly describes how social responsibility is key to an engineer’s role today:
“Social responsibility is not a new issue for the engineering profession. It is fundamental to defining engineering as a profession. Following the concept that the outward part of an engineer’s social responsibility is affecting public policy, the engineering profession is challenged today to help define social responsibly as part of defining the principles and practices of sustainable development. ”
For better understanding look to presentation bellow:
The most important thing to solve in construction is waste management. It is difficult to give exact figures of construction waste produced on a typical construction site, but it is estimated that it is as much as 30% of the total weight of building materials delivered to a building site [1]. In 2020, the total waste generated in the EU by all economic activities and households amounted to 2,151 million tonnes or 4,808 kilograms per capita (1 picture):
In the EU, construction contributed 37.1 % of the total in 2020 and was followed by mining and quarrying (23.4 %), manufacturing (10.9 %), waste and water services (10.7 %), and households (9.5 %). The remaining 8.4 % was waste generated from other economic activities, mainly services (4.5 %) and energy (2.3 %). A lot of the waste from mining and quarrying and from construction and demolition is classified as major mineral waste [2].
Construction and demolition waste (CDW) accounts for more than a third of all waste generated in the EU. It contains a wide variety of materials such as concrete, bricks, wood, glass, metals and plastic. It includes all the waste produced by the construction and demolition of buildings and infrastructure, as well as road planning and maintenance [3].
Some components of CDW have a high resource value, while others may have a lower value, but could still be easily reprocessed into new products or materials. Technology for the separation and the recovery of construction and demolition waste is well established, readily accessible and generally inexpensive.
When it is not separated at source, construction and demolition waste can also contain small amounts of hazardous materials such as solvents and asbestos. These can pose particular risks to the environment and impede recycling (Lithuania’s factsheed attached: CDW_Lithuania_Factsheet_Final)
For more information about plastic waste look here:https://www.storyofstuff.org/movies/plastic/where-your-recycled-plastic-ends-up/
So, how can we work and live with all this? The Economist trying to find solution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3PYYadvwkOo
Some extra videos helps to understand brighter context. Good examples: Copenhagen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUbHGI-kHsU&t=8s