CIRCULAR ECONOMY PRINCIPLES IN THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW

Abstract

The impact of the consumerism economy model on environmental degradation, waste generation, and resource depletion has heightened the attention of industry practitioners, academic scholars, and policymakers toward the adoption of the Circular Economy in the last few decades. Consequently, being a resource-intensive and waste-generating industry, the built environment has embraced the paradigm shift from a take-make-use-dispose approach to emerging economy models to withstand future shocks. While the literature on circular economy concepts, frameworks, and business models is rapidly growing, the empirical evidence regarding the practical implementation of circularity principles is scarce within the built environment. However, transitioning to a circular built environment is unrealizable unless principles of circularity are fully integrated into the building lifecycle. Consequently, the present study investigates the research trajectory of Circular Economy Principles (CEP) within the built environment through a systematic literature review. The study employed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis framework to conduct a literature search on two prominent databases, Web of Science and Google Scholar, and thematic analysis was conducted to evaluate the research trend and identify the knowledge gap. The review found that significant attention was given to certain circularity principles, while others received less focus over the past decade. Additionally, the study uncovered areas where further exploration is needed because of the existing knowledge gaps identified in the current study. This study sheds light on the evolving landscape of the circular economy within the built environment, underscores the progress made, and concludes with the areas that require further exploration to achieve a circular built environment.