Emergy parameters for ensuring sustainable use of building materials

Abstract

The transition towards a more resource efficient economy require suitable policies to regulate the resources needed to support development initiatives. Unregulated extraction of natural resources to support infrastructure expansion activities has led to resource constraints and environmental degradation. Hence an appropriate regulatory tool is necessary to ensure sustainability in resource use. The utility of emergy for resource use regulation in the construction industry has been demonstrated in this study. Emergy analysis has been identified as a comprehensive approach which is able to accommodate the work done by biosphere towards the formation of resources along with the energy used, until refined products are evolved out of them. An environmentally fragile area has been chosen as the study area and building data for the past 25 years has been analyzed using emergy approach to evaluate the environmental performance of buildings. Different parameters to assess sustainability of materials and processes connected with construction sector has been evolved in line with the thermodynamic principles. Further, the investigations undertaken have also established that a sustainable material use policy can be evolved across the required time periods to facilitate efficient utilization of natural resources and building materials. Emergy per unit cost, emergy per unit area of the building and percentage of emergy content in various building materials are identified as the key parameters that could be used to regulate the environmental sustainability of resource use in the construction sector. Also, establishing a time scale based resource use factor to ensure renewability of every natural resource would help not only to evolve strategies for optimum resource use but also to identify the potential options for recycling/reuse of construction materials.