Waste minimisation in practice

One of the major hindrances to waste minimisation on a construction site is the difficulty in establishing a methodology and using this methodology to benchmark future construction projects. This paper introduces SMARTWaste, a software tool that has been used to audit, reduce and target waste arisin gs on a construction site. This tool tries to link the construction process and the waste hierarchy. That is reducing waste on a construction site rat her than landfilling it. Three applications of the SMARTWaste software will be discussed using case studies from three different types of construction . An evaluation of these case studies shows that, by implementing a waste m inimisation scheme on-site, you can improve material recovery for reuse. Al so, by using the waste arisings as a benchmark you can reduce your waste ar isings on future sites. Application of SMARTWaste or a similar waste minimi sation tool on a wider basis could reduce waste arisings and could result i n a built environment that consumed less natural resources and energy, and also produced less pollution and waste. Such a built environment would be e nvironmentally and socially more responsive and responsible. (C) 2001 Elsev ier Science B.V. All rights reserved.