BREEAM principles for circular buildings
BREEAM Circularity Technical Working Group
February 2023
Introduction
The evidence is clear: if we’re to stay on a net zero carbon trajectory for the lifecycle of buildings, we must change our approach to design, material selection, and use. We need to think of buildings as an evolving process. We need to change our attitude from ‘take-make-use-discard’ to ‘remake-reuse’, and design for dismantling. In other words, we need to facilitate the transition towards a “circular” built environment.
The linear economic model, in which we extract , consume and discard materials, is not sustainable. The circular economy model is a system that enables us to better manage our material impact in the environment and society, so that it is regenerated, instead of steadily degrading. In a regenerative circular model, there is no such thing as waste – everything is reused.
As an industry, we need to continue to work towards a more circular approach to building and the concept of zero waste. At every stage of the construction process, there are opportunities to optimise material cycles, reuse or recycle products, components, and buildings, and for materials to move safely and cyclically. This avoids both toxicity and waste streams, so that material resources can continue to flow around a healthy, circular economy.
The BREEAM circularity strategy consists of three key principles to a circular economy.
Although BREEAM has always pushed the sector forward and encouraged sustainable resource use through all its assessment schemes, we believe we can do more on circular design approaches, and the reuse and repurposing of buildings and materials.
BREEAM will continue to enhance and extend these requirements with clearer signposting of circularity principles and technical criteria. This acknowledges the key role sustainable frameworks play in providing solutions to improve regeneration of materials, design, and systems in the built environment.
Through BREEAM’s Circularity Technical Working Group, we have made a collaborative effort to address these gaps to enable BREEAM to support a more circular approach to the built environment.
Our principles and commitments outline the circular economy strategy that will apply across the future family of BREEAM schemes. We have offered guidance on what each of those principles could involve, although in the context of a true circular built environment, it is understood that these are all interlinked.
The intention is to enable BREEAM to provide a holistic and comprehensive strategy in construction for a circular economy across projects for clients. These principles will underpin the development of all circularity assessment technical criteria moving forward.