Cover Page

Resource Salvation

The Architecture of Reuse

 

Mark Gorgolewski

 

Ryerson University

Toronto

 

 

 

 

 

Wiley Logo

Foreword

The notion of using the site and surrounding area as the first place to look for resources is unfamiliar and foreign to most current designers. But in the past, and in some parts of the world even today, discarding materials was not an option, as new materials were expensive or not easily available, and innovation included working creatively with materials that had a past life.

In any urban society there is a massive stock of available materials from demolition and industrial waste that is currently discarded but has potential value. Although the infrastructure to locate and use these resources is currently lacking, some industry leaders are establishing design strategies, material recovery processes, construction management approaches and manufacturing systems to create innovative new ways of using them in the built environment. This book explores the creative opportunities and practical aspects of this gradual move to a more circular way of thinking about material resources in the built environment. In particular, the focus is on reuse of materials and components, including both construction salvage and waste streams from other industries.

In The Science of the Artificial, Herbert Simon describes design as ‘the process by which we devise courses of action aimed at changing existing situations into preferred ones’. If we wish to create a more ecologically based built environment, we need not only to design more sustainable buildings but, more fundamentally, to devise a system and infrastructure that will achieve this. This is what this book is working towards.

Acknowledgements

The book is dedicated to my wonderful and supportive family, Grazyna, Krysia, Adam and Stefan – thank you.

Thanks go to all the various architects, designers, builders and others who have provided information, images, comments, edits, ideas and help in compiling the case studies and practitioner examples in this book. I am also grateful to Sandra Wojtecki for her help in compiling some of the case studies.

Definitions

Circular Economy refers to a closed-loop model of an economy where waste is eliminated and product are sold, consumed, collected and then reused, remade into new products, returned as nutrients to the environment or incorporated into global energy flows.

Cradle to Cradle (also referred to as C2C) models human industry on nature's processes viewing materials as nutrients circulating in healthy, safe metabolisms and separates these into technical and biological nutrients.

Deconstruction describes a process of selective disassembly of a building at the end of its life to recover materials and components or systems for potential reuse or recycling. It is an approach to building removal that can extract resources so they can be used for high value future uses.

Design for deconstruction (or disassembly) describes how a building is designed to be readily taken apart at the end of its useful life so that the components can have a second use. To facilitate this, a design team needs to consider how the major systems can be deconstructed during renovations and end-of-life.

Design for durability considers extending the life of a building and its individual components. This can mean choosing long-life components but also creating adaptability in a building as a means to extend its service life and its potential for repurposing.

Diversion (waste diversion, landfill diversion) is the process of diverting waste from landfills or incinerators through various means such as reuse, recycling, composting or gas production through anaerobic digestion. Waste diversion is a key component of effective and sustainable waste management and a major policy objective of many governments.

Embodied energy/carbon is the energy (and resultant carbon emission) used in all the processes necessary to produce a material or component.

Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) is a policy approach in which a producer is held responsible (physically and/or financially) for a product in the post-consumer stage of a product's life cycle. EPR makes producers consider what will happen to their products after first use and incentivises them to use resources in a way that allows them to have second lives.

Life cycle analysis (LCA) is a comprehensive method for assessing a range of environmental impacts across the full life cycle of a product system, from materials acquisition to manufacturing, use and final disposition. The ISO standard ISO 14040 defines the processes for carrying out LCA calculations.

Linear Economy is a consumption model of an economy where a product is sold, consumed and discarded (take–make–waste).

Reclaim is to recover something of value from a waste stream.

Salvage is typically something extracted from the waste stream as valuable or useful.

Sustainable Materials Management (SMM) is an approach to promote sustainable materials use, integrating actions targeted at reducing negative environmental impacts and preserving natural capital throughout the life cycle of materials, taking into account economic efficiency and social equity.

Virgin materials (also known as primary materials) are resources extracted from nature in their raw form, such as stone, timber or metal ore that have not been previously used or consumed.

Zero Waste is a policy concept that focuses on creating a cyclical system, reducing waste, reusing products and recycling and composting/digesting the rest, with the ultimate goal of eliminating all waste and achieving zero waste to landfill.