Circe addresses business innovation under a Circular Economy approach

The partner organisation of Construye 2020+ project organised on 14th November at its facilities in Zaragoza the workshop «Business innovation undera Circular Economy approach in sector», which was attended by more than ten sectoral professionals.

Circe, as a Construye 2020+ partner, has organized a workshop to promote business innovation through Circular Economy with the aim of providing to construction companies some keys about innovation, and some concepts that they can use as an added value such as Circular Economy and Environmental Product Declarations (EPD).

In order to achieve this aim, the concepts of circular economy have been explained, together with explanation new construction sector trends. In addition, they informated about regulatory requirements and challenges of EPD for companies that produced these construction materials. They showed advantages of the eco-labelling products.

The event began with an introductionof Construye 2020+ project by Andrea Conserva, from Circe, who presented the speakers and discussed topics. During the event, three presentations were given to discuss EPD and another three, to analyse Circular Economy in construction sector.

Don’t miss the video of the meeting!

David Zambrana, from Circe, explained the origin and opportunities of the environmentally friendly product for companies. He has showed key concepts and stages of the procedure that has to be followed to obtain this label. As a case of good practice, Jose Manuel Gra, from Gres Aragón, explained his business experience in EPD obtained process, he also reported the production processes that had to be modified and the advantages of market and manufacturing.

For his part, David Cambra of University of Zaragoza, has compiled the advantages of products with an eco-label, among which is obtaining credits in Building Research Establishment’s Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) -an international method for measuring the degree of environmental sustainability of buildings -, which is applied by this university in the new Campus building.

The challenges of new construction sector

In addition, related to environmental certification and Circular Economy concept, they have showed the plan carried out for reuse and recycle worksite waste. Anna Manyes from ROCKWOOL presented the work done to define reliable indicators, to measure the circularity of construction sector, also she described the indicators defined so far.

Daniel Serón from the Coalition of Companies for a Low Carbon and Circular Economy (COEPLAN), shared the sectoral companies experiences that have integrated circularity criteria in their productions (for example: natural wood for cladding, aluminium windows with thermal break, etc.). For each product, the ‘life cycle’ analysis methodology has been explained in order to calculate its impacts.

Continuing with circular economy, Pedro Extremera explained how to reuse construction and demolition waste, showing, among other things, the case of a megalith (a construction system with multiple applications and prefabricated with 100% recycled aggregates).

At the end, they were a reflection space for questions and exchange opinions between speakers and attendees. One of the main conclusions was that construction sector has a little interest and knowledge about topics discussed, so it is necessary to promote and disseminate these concepts in order to achieve a sustainable sector.