Pedagogical Innovations for Integrating Circular Economy Principles in Built Environment Higher and Further Education

The built environment is responsible for approximately 36% of carbon emissions in Europe, 40% of energy consumption, and over 50% of extracted virgin materials, as well as generating one third of total waste (European Commission, 2020). Historically, strategies to reduce the environmental impact have focused on lowering operational carbon through improved performance standards in new buildings and the retrofit of existing ones. However, addressing carbon operational alone is insufficient. Increasing attention is now directed towards embodied carbon, virgin material depletion, and waste generation, prompting the development of regulations and policies such as the EU Circular Economy Action Plan (Spani, 2020) and the revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (European Commission, 2024). The EPBD mandates the assessment and reporting of embodied carbon in new buildings, utilizing established standards such as EN 15978 and Level(s). Many European countries have also implemented regional initiatives; for example, the Netherlands has adopted the circular construction economy transition agenda for achieving a circular construction economy by 2050 (De circulaire Bouweconomie, 2019), while the UK’s London Plan includes specific requirements for whole-life carbon assessments and circular economy statements in major developments (Greater London Authority, 2022). The circular economy (CE) is increasingly recognized as a key framework for achieving sustainability in the built environment and understanding how CE principles can be effectively implemented has become a central theme in both academic and industry discourse. Numerous scholarly and industry initiatives have sought to demonstrate CE in practice. For example, Cheshire (2021) has developed a framework for the application of circular economy principles in the built environment around the concepts of “Building in layers”, “Designing out of waste”, “Designing for adaptability”, “Designing for disassembly”, and “selecting material”. Eberhardt et al., (2022) have also conducted a literature review and categorized circular economy strategies in the built environment according to their level of application (building, component, material) and level of readiness. For a more industry-focused audience, the Architects Climate Action Network (ACAN), a coalition of professionals from architecture and related built environment sectors has developed an 11-part