The European Manufacturers of Expanded Polystyrene (EUMEPS) is the voice of the Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) industry. It has published an op-ed welcoming the European Commission’s commitment to a Renovation Wave and the outline of its strategy shared in the roadmap published in May 2020. It believes that this initiative is a great opportunity for scaling-up current renovation rates and EU’s climate and energy efficiency goals.
EUMEPS agrees that increased renovation can be a key contributor to creating jobs and stimulating economic recovery in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. It embraces the Commission’s finding that buildings are also critical for making circularity work and its objective to implement the Renovation Wave in line with circular economy principles.
restado is a platform promoting a circular approach in the construction sector.
The platform encourages the reuse of reclaimed construction materials. It provides support and knowledge on how to reclaim and reuse the materials, and offers a marketplace to trade them.
Samen werken aan circulaire fietsinfrastructuur. Een integrale en systematische aanpak by Stichting Circulair Bouwen is a report on a 2-year programme carried out with EU funds on building a circular bicycle road infrastructure. Over this period of time, valuable information has been gathered on how to promote and organize circular building efficiently.
To follow up on the programme, a multi-year project will be carried out in cooperation with governments, companies, educational institutions and NGOs, under the lead of the Radboud University Nijmegen, which will include two important policy fields:
encouraging cycling (low carbon, public health, better access to congested cities, car traffic reduction) and
The company O.C.O Technology Limited recycles a hazardous by-product of waste incineration in order to produce a carbon-negative material for the construction industry.
The potential of reusing and extending the life of products is well documented, but there is also huge untapped innovation potential in the industrial circular economy.
This involves reusing and extending the life of manufactured molecules. It's an area which is under-researched and under-exploited. It entails reusing high-purity loops of atoms and molecules rather than recycling mixed waste. Considerable chemical expertise is required, including the design of new molecules and mini-mill technologies to separate existing materials. Innovative collection and sorting processes which are not destructive and do not mix materials will also need to be developed. Policy could close the invisible liability loop by stipulating Extended Producer Liability.
Ultra Thin White Topping is a road hardening innovation, applied to pilot projects in Frysland and Overijssel by Schagen Infra BV.
To replace damaged asphalt sustainably, the company renovated the degenerated road surface using a thin layer of cement with polyester fibres mixed in. This reduced resource consumption and enabled full material recovery at end of life.
MaterialDistrict is a match-making platform in the field of innovative materials, connecting material manufacturers and distributors with creative professionals and providing designers with information about materials.
The categories of materials are:
Plastics
Other naturals
Wood
Metals
Glass
Coatings
Ceramics
Concretes
Natural stones
There are listings for each material, with tags such as "biobased" or "recycling", making it very easy to find a circular material. Manufacturers and suppliers can promote and sell their goods, and creative professionals can look for the material that is right for their project.
Europe has an ambitious vision of a carbon-neutral future, a vision that integrates energy-intensive industries as well as the construction sector and its entire value chain.
Cement, which binds concrete together, is at the heart of solutions to turn this vision into reality. These solutions span over the entire cement and concrete value chain: from raw materials to production, use, re-use, and recycling.
CEMBUREAU, the European Cement Association, as part of its effort to move towards a carbon-neutral construction sector, has taken stock of progress done since the publication of its 2050 Low Carbon Roadmap in 2013 and mapped routes to a resource-efficient and carbon-neutral built environment.
