Re-Use of Building Components: Meta-Analysis

Today, it is important to prevent or reduce construction & demolition waste as much as possible also to minimize natural resource consumption in order to ensure sustainability in the built environment. In cases, where it is not possible to prevent waste, waste generation can be minimized by re-using building products. Also keeping materials and elements in a closed loop in the construction industry. However, due to the lack of sufficient information about the reuse strategy, these applications are not yet common in the construction industry. In the study, it was aimed to explain the reuse strategy at the building component/element level, to eliminate the lack of information and to create a data set. The scope of this study, the current situation in the literature has been determined by the method of meta-analysis in order to create a roadmap of this study area at the building component/element level. Using the Scopus and Science-Direct databases, studies on the reuse of building components between the years 2000-2021 were examined. The studies in this context were analysed in two stages; (i) the number of studies conducted in this field and their distribution by years were examined, (ii) the scope of the study was limited by the literature analysis table which includes a detailed examination of the studies (n=20). It has been observed that the studies of re-use strategy within the scope of sustainability in the building were often carried out by the UK (20%) and Australia (15%), and the number of studies in literature has gained momentum since 2019. Despite that, this field in the literature has a lack of detailed information for building component level. It is believed that this study will guide architects and researchers who will work on this field in the future by providing supporting information and data set about the strategy.