Accelerating sustainable circularity for construction products: from concepts to practice
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Circular innovations respond to the need for unconventional sustainability systems thinking but are yet to become mainstream for the construction sector. Despite the recent proliferation of circular economy strategies, major impediments including technical, socio-cultural, economic, organisational, regulatory and informational, hinder their practical implementation and the transition in the built environment. This scoping review maps and synthesises evidence on accelerating circular innovation uptake in construction through the synergistic interaction of five strands of enablers: circularity assessment frameworks, construction 4.0, circular business models, policy drivers and demonstration pilots . Within the proposed solution framework, the interdependent sustainability model is directly linked to two acceleration levers including circularity assessment frameworks and circular business models. However, these two levers remain isolated without the policy lever in shaping the future landscape of circularity. Construction 4.0 then provides the digital enabler for standardising practice, while demonstration pilots provide practical evidence of implementation of the acceleration levers. Taken together, these focal levers are key to accelerating sustainable circularity for construction products. The key contribution is not the introduction of a new set of solution categories; rather, a demonstration of how these existing levers apply across multiple layers of implementation and becomes fully harnessed when deployed as interdependent solutions.
Institutions: University of Leeds, University of Bath, University of Toronto
Language: English
Subfield: Strategy and Management
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W7202046614