Sustainable approaches to C&D waste management and global warming impacts

Abstract

Increased diversion rates for construction and demolition (C&D) debris from US landfill sites are not only good from a sustainability viewpoint, but it is also an achievable goal. When deconstruction occurs, effective planning begins to take advantage of all technologies and processes available for recycling and reuse along with emerging markets for transformed C&D materials and secondary products. The data collected and analysed in this paper suggests that the benefits of increasing C&D diversion rates resulting primarily from deconstruction projects will have tremendous positive impacts upon a sustainable future, which includes energy production, virgin materials, end items, processed materials and reduced global warming. Deconstruction projects of the Department of Defense (DoD) military installations are analysed in detail in this paper. Although the DoD has been pioneering many C&D solid waste management projects to reap the benefits of high diversion rates from landfills, there have been discernible efforts by industry to attain diversion rates as high as 90% in many instances.