Digital Solutions for a Circular Facade Economy

Abstract

In the Dutch government attempting to become fully circular 2050, VMRG, a Dutch Metal Façade Association, has initiated several pilot projects. Two of the most prominent ones are Cirlinq, an asset management platform for documenting building facades, and FaSA (Façade Service Applicate), a collective of stakeholders aiming to use drones and image recognition technology predict the maintenance requirement of facades. There are also attempts to extend the producers' responsibility by developing new business models in collaboration with TU Delft, resulting in developing a Façade Leasing Business model. However, despite these several initiatives and the emergence of new technology to facilitate them, there was still a lack of clarity on how they can be integrated to collect, organize and use façade information to enable decision-making at its End of service.

The first steps of the research involved conducting a literature review on the current state of the art in Circularity, the façade industry, and digital technology in the lifecycle of a façade. A preliminary framework was generated that conceptually maps out the information generated in the lifecycle of a façade, a data structure to store this information, and a conceptual framework for a façade product passport. Based on this preliminary framework, several hypotheses were tested and validated or refuted using surveys and interviews, which helped develop a more detailed framework. This contains detailed process maps of stakeholder roles in the supply chain of the façade, the digital methods used, and information exchanged in the process.

Several criteria are identified by referring to additional literature that can influence the End of Service (EoS) scenario of a façade and are categorized and arranged into decision trees, which eventually can form a framework for a computational tool. These are then grouped into modules which, when processed together, results in a decision. The criteria were then co-related to the information currently exchanged by the stakeholders to determine what is most crucial to making a decision. During this process, it was found that most information required to make a decision is un-processable by computational methods; firstly, they are in unstructured data formats such as documents, and secondly, the necessary criteria to make a decision are subjective and still need human interpretation. Therefore, the decision-making framework can either be used to evaluate existing facades scheduled for demolition or determine the crucial information to be entered in the passport for facades that are not yet constructed.

The entire framework from information capture, organization, and end-of-life decision-making is then demonstrated with information received of the CiTG Façade in the TU Delft campus as part of the Façade Leasing project TU Delft. During this evaluation, it was found that several essential information about the façade not available, and hence the façade was evaluated by assuming industry-standard processes and references to external databases such as the Granta Edu Pack. Information that is available and information generated is noted, which indicates the most crucial information required for EoS Decision making. During the EoS assessment process, while the façade can be disassembled and reused, it can be done early to design a new building, as it had fixed non-modular dimensions. Many conditions have to be considered, mainly regarding sizing, geometry, positioning, and structural system of the façade while designing the building for the CiTG façade to be reused. It was also found that recycling and energy recovery of the façade is only possible if the separation between the aluminum profiles and the thermal barrier is achieved. Although specific modules such as the condition assessment and the performance assessment could not be thoroughly carried out, a table with results of the assessments is generated and therefore acts as a starting point of how this framework can eventually be used and adapted to assess different facades. This framework can be eventually be developed in an iterative manner which can expand it to cater to multiple façade typologies and eventually forming a basis for an EoS assessment tool. All the research questions are answered at the end, acting as a summary of findings. As this research is just a starting point for further in-depth research, conclusions are made regarding recommendations to the Dutch Metal Façade industry and the following possible research stages.