The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2022 set three main goals to cut carbon emissions and prevent environmental disasters: Rapid phasing out of fossil fuels, transition to renewable energy, and investment in carbon dioxide removal projects. Rapid actions are necessary to mitigate the highest levels of global greenhouse gas emissions in human history recorded between 2010 to 2019[1]. The UN environment programme reports that emissions from buildings operations accounted for around 28% of the total global-related CO2 emissions in 2020[2]. The Carbon Leadership Forum proposed policy toolkits for different stakeholders to reduce embodied carbon[3]. Materials experimentations and counting carbon emissions are promoting new design possibilities that have a key role in terms of life-cycle analysis (LCA) of the built environment (BE)[4],[5].
DTs and Lo-Tek
Most of the LCA tools included in the Circular Digital Built environment (CDB) framework come from first applications to new constructions design and cultural heritage documentation. Over the “Fourth Industrial Revolution”[6], recent studies that involved experts in digital technologies (DTs) showed how these technologies can support the transition from the linear to the circular economy in the BE: Am/Rm, AI, BDA, BCT, BIM, digital platforms, digital twins, GIS, Material passports & Databanks, IoT[7],[8]. DTs are nowadays experience-available in different contexts and also in the form of open-source software. Some valuable models based on LCA and DTs have already proposed strategies for enhancing the sustainability of the BE in specific contexts[9],[10].
The Ellen McArthur Foundation’s (EMF) main commitment harnesses technological advances to circular economic growth, guaranteeing the resources’ security[11]. Already in 2016, MacArthur and Waughray sponsored the concept of a circular economy as restorative and regenerative by design[12]. With this purpose, the Circular Engineering for Architecture (CEA) appeal to digital innovations to narrow, slow, close and regenerate the resources loop in the building sector. At the same time, awareness emerged of Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and coupled human-natural systems (CHANS) to design replicable models, preserving and restoring the functionality of our remaining intact ecosystem[13],[14]. The continuity of cultural practices supports cultural sustainability in the BE[15],[16],[17]. In the last years, the CEA proved the effectiveness of regenerative design in digital practice through research and real case studies[18]. However, DTs have not yet been commonly leveraged for enhancing traditional or non-mechanical technology (lo-Tech) practices and importing critical thinking on infrastructure design.
CEA design
Among all the aspects, the fast urban sprawl in developing and developed countries is being one of the most significant human impacts from an environmental point of view[19]. Currently, per capita emissions in the Global South (GS) are low[20]. The boost of the urban agglomerations comes along with exponential growth of the per capita emissions to address changes in incomes and lifestyle[21]. The two strategies to reduce the embodied carbon emissions in the building sector are the improvement of materials efficiency and the choice of low carbon content materials[22],[23]. In the GS, but also in areas of the developed countries, are still available examples of lo-Tech vernacular infrastructures and architectures with a relatively low impact of embodied and operational carbon emissions. These good practices have been increasingly threatened by imported BE solutions over the last decades. Recent research emphasized their potential power in regenerating, slowing and narrowing the loop in the CE[24].
If, on the one hand, materials research is going further, on the other hand, lo-TEK design – local, inexpensive, handmade, embedded with traditional ecological knowledge – needs to be integrated worldwide into the digital innovation of the CEA. Best practices must urge to shape countries’ rising in a full circularity according to the cradle-to-cradle approach[25]. Thus, the integration of lo-tech constructive details benefits from the CDB framework where conservation principles, and so documentation, can be strictly linked to construction, influencing new design or storing information in databases[26]. In this way, the CEA offers digital innovation for supporting decision-makers and policymakers to implement mitigation strategies at different scales (one point listed in the latest IPCC_AR6 report)[27].
Empowerment of CEA
DTs of the CEA might inspire protocols for urban planning that consider building and infrastructures from material and constructive details points of view. More specifically, the CEA, empowered by digital innovations, enables to find building solutions at the architectural scale. Therefore, CEA proves to drive low greenhouse gas emission choices in developing countries, exploiting advanced technologies to enhance the qualities of lo-TEK infrastructures. Within this vision, the digital innovation enables a more sustainable GS rise, analysing, documenting and inflecting the traditional ecological knowledge of the local vernacular architecture under possible shapes. As a result, the use of DTs in the CDB framework enables new critical thinking during the design phases, boosting the CE as it has never been possible in the past.
[1] Climate Change 2022 – Mitigation of Climate Change. Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – Working group III; SPM-4. Available online: https://report.ipcc.ch/ar6wg3/pdf/IPCC_AR6_WGIII_FinalDraft_FullReport.pdf.
[2] Hamilton I., Kennard H., Rapf O., Kockat J., Zuhaib S., Simjanovic J., Toth Z. 2021 Global Status Report for Building and Construction – Towards a zero-emission, efficient and resilient buildings and construction sector. Available online: https://globalabc.org/sites/default/files/2021-10/GABC_Buildings-GSR-2021_BOOK.pdf.
[3] https://carbonleadershipforum.org/clf-carbon-policy-toolkit/.
[4] Havinga L., De Wolf C., Marvuglia A., Naboni E. Eds. Carbon & Ecology within the design process – Environmental Impact Assessment. In Regenerative design in digital practice. A Handbook for the Built Environment; Naboni E., Havinga L. Eds..; Eurac: Bolzano, Italy, 2019; pp.217-261.
[5] King B. Ed. The New Carbon Architecture. Building to cool the climate; New Society Publishers: Gabriola Island, Canada, 2017.
[6] World Economic Forum Annual Meeting. Davos, 2016. Available online: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/01/9-quotes-that-sum-up-the-fourth-industrial-revolution/.
[7] Çetin, DeWolf, Bocken 2021.
[8] Raghu D., Markopoulou A., Marengo M., Neri I., Chronis A., De Wolf C. Enabling component reuse from existing buildings through machine learning. Using Google Street View to Enhance Building Databases. In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Computer-Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia, Sydney, Australia, 9–15 April, 2022; pp.577-586.
[9] De Wolf C., Cerezo C., Murtadhawi Z., Hajiah A., Al Mumin A., Ochsendorf J., Reinhart C. Life cycle building impact of a Middle Eastern residential neighbourhood. Energy. 2017, 134, 336-348.
[10] Naboni E., Havinga L. Eds. Case studies of regenerative design. From Principles to Realizations. In Regenerative design in digital practice. A Handbook for the Built Environment; Naboni E., Havinga L. Eds.; Eurac: Bolzano, Italy, 2019; pp.347-410.
[11] Ellen MacArthur, Dominic Waughray: Intelligent Assets: Unlocking The Circular Economy Potential. Ellen MacArthur Foundation. 2016, 3.
[12] Ibidem.
[13] Watson J. Sacred Innovation in the Shadow Conservation Network. Nakhara: Journal of Environmental Design and Planning. 2016, 12, 55-68. Available online: https://ph01.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/nakhara/article/view/103514/82774.
[14] May J. Building without Architects – A global guide to everyday architecture; Ivy Press, Lewes, East Sussex, UK, 2010.
[15] Postalcı İ. E., Atay G. F. Rethinking on Cultural Sustainability in Architecture: Projects of Behruz Çinici. Sustainability. 2019, 11(4), 1069, 2. Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/su11041069.
[16] Schittich C. Ed. Vernacular Architecture – Atlas for Living Throughout the World; Birkhäuser, Basel, Switzerland, 2019.
[17] Watson J. Lo-TEK. Design by Radical Indigenism; Taschen, Italy, 2019; pp.21.
[18] Naboni, Havinga (eds) 2019
[19] Climate Change 2022 – Mitigation of Climate Change. Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – Working group III; TS-21. Available online: https://report.ipcc.ch/ar6wg3/pdf/IPCC_AR6_WGIII_FinalDraft_FullReport.pdf.
[20] Ibidem.
[21] Ibidem.
[22] De Wolf C., Ramage M., Ochsendorf J. Low carbon vaulted masonry structures. Journal of the International Association for shell and spatial structures. 2016, 57(4), 275-284.
[23] Kupwade-Patil K., De Wolf C., Chin S., Ochsendorf J., Hajiah Ali E., Al-Mumin A., Büyüköztürk O. Impact of Embodied Energy on materials/buildings with partial replacement of ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) by natural Pozzolanic Volcanic Ash. Journal of Cleaner Production. 2018, 177, 547-554.
[24] Çetin S., De Wolf C., Bocken N. Circular Digital Built Environment: An Emerging Framework. Sustainability. 2021, 13, 6348. Available online: https://doi.org/10.3390/su13116348.
[25] McDonough, W.; Braungart, M. Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things; North Point Press: New York, NY, USA, 2010.
[26] Nazareth A. P. How close is the built environment to achieving circularity? In Proceedings of the SBE19 Brussels BAMB-CIRCPATH “Buildings as Material Banks—A Pathway for a Circular Future”, Brussels, Belgium, 5–7 February 2019; pp.1-8.
[27] Climate Change 2022 – Mitigation of Climate Change. Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – Working group III. Available online: https://report.ipcc.ch/ar6wg3/pdf/IPCC_AR6_WGIII_FinalDraft_FullReport.pdf.
