Integrating Circular Economy (CE) Principles into Construction Waste Management (CWM) Through Multiple Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM)

Sustainability 2025
Thilina Ganganath WEERAKOON, Jānis Zvirgzdiņš, Sanda Lapuķe, Sulaksha WIMALASENA, Pēteris Druķis

The construction sector is a major contributor to global waste output, with construction and demolition waste (CDW) producing substantial environmental, economic, and logistical challenges. Traditional methods for handling waste in developing countries have failed to implement sustainability concepts successfully, resulting in inefficient resource consumption and increasing landfill reliance. This study develops an Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) framework to integrate circular economy (CE) principles into construction waste management (CWM). The framework evaluates four criteria under economic, environmental, social, and technological categorization and applies expert-based pairwise comparisons to prioritize alternative strategies. To ensure reliability, the results were further validated through sensitivity analysis and cross-validation using complementary MCDM methods, including the TOPSIS, WSM, and WPM. The research attempted to determine the most successful waste management approach by examining critical economic, social, technical, and environmental issues in the setting of Sri Lanka as a case study. A hierarchical model was built, and expert views were gathered using pairwise comparisons to assess the relative importance of each criterion. The results showed that environmental considerations had the greatest relative importance (41.6%), followed by economic (38.4%), technical (12.6%), and social aspects (7.4%). On-site waste segregation appeared as the most suitable method owing to its immediate contribution to sustainability, while off-site treatment, prefabrication, modular construction, and waste-to-energy conversion followed. The research underlines the significance of organized decision-making in waste management and advises incorporating real-time data analytics and artificial intelligence to boost adaptable and sustainable construction practices.

Atslēgas vārdi
Analytic hierarchy process | Circular economy | Decision support system | Multiple criteria decision-making | Sustainable construction
DOI
10.3390/su17177770
Hipersaite
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/17/7770

Weerakoon, T.G., Zvirgzdiņš, J., Lapuķe, S., Wimalasena, S., Druķis, P. Integrating Circular Economy (CE) Principles into Construction Waste Management (CWM) Through Multiple Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM). Sustainability, 2025, Vol. 17, No. 17, Article number 7770. e-ISSN 2071-1050. Pieejams: doi:10.3390/su17177770

Publikācijas valoda
English (en)