A collaborative project between cities and companies across Europe aims to demonstrate the circular economy's potential in the construction industry. It implements sustainable and circular construction practices, which have not been seriously demonstrated at a city level. It aims to demonstrate the reuse of materials, refurbishing buildings, and designing for disassembly and flexible construction while establishing collaboration and knowledge sharing to encourage other cities to do the same.

The construction industry is currently extremely unsustainable, both in the materials and practices. The World Green Building Council report “Buildings and construction account for 39% of energy-related CO2 emissions” indicated that the construction industry uses vast raw materials. While many techniques and approaches have been developed to address circular construction, none have been demonstrated effectively at a city or regional level.

The cities of Copenhagen, Hamburg, London, and the Helsinki region, together with a number of industry partners, are collaborating between 2019-2023 to demonstrate the principles of circular construction across each city. The project is funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 research program.

Each city is delivering nine demonstrations, which will illustrate: Reuse and recycling of materials Extending building life through transformation and refurbishment Designing for disassembly and flexible construction

The project also seeks to establish knowledge and skills sharing to support cities in implementing circular construction solutions by developing recommendations and establishing a knowledge database and sharing structure to disseminate experience, knowledge, and practices to others.

There will also be consistent data collection, analysis, and management, including: Developing a list of indicators to provide an overview of circularity at the city level Creating a material stock and flow database

The intended impacts are: To reduce carbon emissions and increase regenerative capacity in the four cities. Reduce yearly consumption of virgin materials by 20% in new built environments. To demonstrate cost savings of 15%.

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