Sustainability Evaluation Using a Life Cycle and Circular Economy Approach in Precast Concrete with Waste Incorporation

Abstract

Waste valorisation as secondary or alternative raw materials in several sectors products and processes has been an important way to implement a more sustainable and circular way to manage the efficient use of natural resources. This action contributes not only to save natural resources but also to prevent sending large amounts of wastes, some of them dangerous, to landfill disposal, creating a major environmental, economic and social impact. To promote circular economy, this work attempts to demonstrate the environmental gains in a competitive way, by bringing together in an industrial symbiosis action, two large producing sectors (the pulp and paper industry and concrete construction sector), which are also able to consume significant amounts of resources and to generate large amounts of wastes. A sustainability evaluation based on a life cycle and circular approach is presented and discussed using a simple case study performed at real industrial scale. The lime ash waste from the pulp and paper industry is used to replace 100% of the natural filler used in precast concrete production and the impacts and benefits from the technical, environmental, economic and social level were assessed. It was demonstrated that this simple action causes positive impacts in the evaluated dimensions of sustainability without causing any changes in production time and causes no degradation on relevant concrete properties.