Critical economic, social and environmental impacts of implementing circular economy practices in Australian school buildings

The circular economy (CE) concept has gained wide attention in many industries, including the construction industry. It substitutes the linear ‘take–make–dispose’ model, and positively impacts the economy, society, and environment. Monitoring and assessing the impacts of CE practices is vital to successfully transforming the construction industry into a circular one. Although a plethora of methods are available for impact assessment, they are not ideal for assessing the impact of CE due to their limited sensitivity to CE-specific impacts. Therefore, this study aims to identify the critical economic, social, and environmental (ESE) impacts specific to the implementation of CE practices. Here, the term ‘impact’ refers to the outcome itself, not its quantitative measurement. The study context was selected as school projects, considering the high prospects for CE implementation and the increasing demand in Australia. A qualitative research methodology was adopted, containing Delphi-based expert interviews for data collection and code-based manual content analysis for data analysis. The sample consists of eighteen experts, who were approached in two Delphi rounds. ESE impacts were investigated for five popular CE practices across the building lifecycle, and critical ESE impacts were shortlisted under each practice. The findings reveal that ESE impacts are dependent on the considered practice, particularly for economic and social pillars. Reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, virgin resource consumption and waste generation were found to be the critical environmental impacts that appeared to be consistent across five practices. This study contributes to the existing body of knowledge by offering a set of CE-specific ESE impacts and supporting the development of a comprehensive impact assessment methodology for school buildings as a future study. In practice, the findings can assist in decision-making for CE implementation in school buildings, considering critical ESE impacts.