Consumption of raw materials and natural resources in construction materials production

Ferriz-Papi, Juan; Prado Govea, Raul

Abstract

It is already known that building construction consumes large quantities of materials. According to the Centre for Sustainable Buildings in Catalonia (CIES), about 2,792.8 kg of construction materials are used in the construction stage. But this amount is the result of other productions for obtaining the different materials. At the end, the impact produced by natural resources consumption for all these productions can be very high.
The main objective of this study is to obtain approximate results for the consumption of natural resources to produce construction materials, and to analyze all the information and results obtained in order to be able to establish different environmental criteria that can help in construction materials selection.
From the results of this study, CIES shows the consumption of construction materials in Catalonia (Spain) per new built square meter. It is established a relationship between the needed raw materials to produce them, and the necessary natural resources to obtain these raw materials. In this way, the final consumption of natural resources is estimated per new built area. The obtained results correspond to part of the ecological rucksack indicator for building sector in the construction stage in Spain.
The results show the largest consumptions and the relevance of some specific materials in natural resources consumption. Besides, it can be established an average consumption result per new built area, which can be used as a reference for the consumption of natural resources in the building sector in Spain, and sets the possibility to introduce this analysis as a part of the environmental evaluation for this sector and a help for designers to introduce environmental criteria in the selection of construction materials. Finally, the establishment of several suggestions is developed for the reduction of natural resources consumption impact.

• Presentation Conference Type: Conference Paper (published)
• Conference Name: RENEWBUILD International Conference and Exhibition
• Start Date: Sep 16, 2013
• End Date: Sep 18, 2013
• Publication Date: Sep 16, 2013
• Deposit Date: Jun 29, 2025
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Pages: 345-362
• Book Title: Application of Efficient & Renewable Energy Technologies in Low Cost Buildings and Construction. International Conference and Exhibition
• ISBN: 9789755072685