PD lab: The development of a biobased cladding system

The building industry consumes a lot of energy, uses a lot of materials and generates a lot of waste. In order to achieve sustainable development, it has to change its focus from merely the use phase to the complete life cycle of buildings. The PD lab is an experimental platform that does so, by setting its aim to develop a modular and...

Rethinking Waste: Urban integration of waste collection and treatment systems based on circular concepts; Recommendations for Amsterdam

The worldwide trends of depleting natural resources and increasing generation of waste create challenges concerning the development and growth of our cities. Urban growth is enforcing these trends, resulting in growing problems and reaching limitations to the growth of our economies. In this thesis, these worldwide trends will be challenged in...

Energy Academy: Power to the people

With technology dependent on electricity increasingly pervading our everyday life the access to energy becomes a driver for our general development and wellbeing. While the access to energy seems as something trivial there is a growing number of people which are unable to pay their electricity bills and are disconnected from the energy grid....

Building collaboration towards a circular economy: A framework for systemic collaboration to accelerate the transition to a circular economy

Problem situation - Global population is expected to double its size in 2030 (EMF, 2013), so will global consumption. Resource scarcity and associated environmental impact has shown that the current way of conducting business is not sustainable (Bocken et al., 2014). A promising alternative is proposed; circular economy. This new economic system...

Economic circularity in the built environment: An assessment and decision-making supporting model for the real estate sector & construction industry

The discourse on circular economy is characterized by perpetual disintegration whilst there is a need for assessment and decision-making supporting models. This normative study proposes a model that assesses the extent to which interventions in the built environment are in accordance with a circular economy (CE) and discloses the financials...

At your service! Circular business model prototypes for a service provider in the construction industry

In recent years the circular economy has gained significant popularity, however practical implementation of the concept has not followed accordingly. Especially in the construction industry there is a need for a practical translation of the concept. This research makes this translation through the mutual development of circular economy theory...

Reflections on Product Lifetime Extension: Validating and Expanding the 'Products That Last' Framework

The book 'Products That Last: Product Design for Circular Business Models' was published as the result of a research project from the faculty of Industrial Design Engineering of Delft University of Technology to shed more light upon how to build businesses that are able to profit from longer product lifetimes and on how to design products that...

A design tool for refurbishment: Generating industry specific design rules

This thesis presents the results of a single case study performed at Philips Refurbished Systems, focusing on a medical imaging system: interventional X-ray, which enables Image Guided Therapy (IGT). The goal of the study was to add value to the refurbishment activities at Refurbished Systems by developing design rules for refurbishment. This...

Consumer acceptance of refurbished mobile phones

Now the detrimental consequences of human consumption become apparent, companies search for ways to extend the product life cycle. Refurbishment is an accessible and cost-effective strategy to regain value from used products and contributes to a more circular consumption model. Driven by a growing commercial interest in refurbishment, this...