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Systematic Review

Material Passports in Construction Waste Management: A Systematic Review of Contexts, Stakeholders, Requirements, and Challenges

by
Lawrence Martin Mankata
1,*,
Prince Antwi-Afari
2,*,
Samuel Frimpong
3 and
S. Thomas Ng
4
1
Department of Civil Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China
2
School of Architecture and Civil Engineering, University of Adelaide, Adelaide 5005, Australia
3
School of Built Environment, University of New South Wales, Sydney 2052, Australia
4
Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China
*
Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Buildings 2025, 15(11), 1825; https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings15111825
Submission received: 28 April 2025 / Revised: 22 May 2025 / Accepted: 24 May 2025 / Published: 26 May 2025
(This article belongs to the Special Issue A Circular Economy Paradigm for Construction Waste Management)
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Abstract

The growth in the adoption of circular economy principles in the construction industry has given rise to material passports as a critical implementation tool. Given the existing problems of high resource use and high waste generation in the construction industry, there is a pressing need to adopt novel strategies and tools to mitigate the adverse impacts of the built environment. However, research on the application of material passports in the context of construction waste management remains limited. The aim of this paper is to identify the contextual uses, stakeholders, requirements, and challenges in the application of material passports for managing waste generated from building construction and demolition processes through a systematic review approach. Comprehensive searches in Scopus and the Web of Science databases are used to identify relevant papers and reduce the risk of selection bias. Thirty-five (35) papers are identified and included in the review. The identified key contexts of use included buildings and cities as material banks, waste management and trading, and integrated digital technologies. Asset owners, waste management operators, construction and deconstruction teams, technology providers, and regulatory and sustainability teams are identified as key stakeholders. Data requirements related to material, components, building stock data, lifecycle, environmental impact data, and deconstruction and handling data are critical. Moreover, the key infrastructure requirements include modeling and analytical tools, collaborative information exchange systems, sensory tracking tools, and digital and physical storage hubs. However, challenges with data management, costs, process standardization, technology, stakeholder collaboration, market demand, and supply chain logistics still limit the implementation. Therefore, it is recommended that future research be directed towards certification and standardization protocols, automation, artificial intelligence tools, economic viability, market trading, and innovative end-use products.

1. Introduction

The impact of construction activities on the environment has long been a concern, with the industry contributing about 35–40% of global solid waste [1,2]. Construction waste typically originates from materials from site clearance and excavation processes, main construction, and post-construction activities, including renovation, refurbishment, and demolition [3,4]. With a growing world population and rapid urbanization, supporting physical infrastructure needs requires more complex construction, thus making waste generation inevitable and likely exponential. On this premise, construction waste management has been a critical part of the industry’s practice and regulatory compliance measures to minimize the generation and optimize the end-use and treatment of waste as much as possible [5,6]. However, the magnitude and diverse composition of construction waste present critical challenges for effective management [7]. A significant volume of salvageable waste still ends up in landfills, and even worse, is illegally dumped in non-regulated jurisdictions [3,8]. According to Balasbaneh et al. [9], building end-of-life stages present complexities in deconstruction and material recovery, affecting waste management efforts after demolition. Amidst the search for concrete solutions, the concept of circular economy emerged as an all-encompassing paradigm to reverse the traditional “take, make use, and dispose” model in the construction industry [10,11].
A circular economy is “an industrial system that is restorative or regenerative by intention and design” [12]. The concept has gained popularity, especially in construction waste management, as it aims to reduce resource use and minimize waste in production and consumption [13,14]. Varied strategies have been applied in adopting the principles of circular economy, with stakeholders often employing alternative approaches towards extending product lifecycles, promoting reuse, recycling, and minimizing waste [9,15]. While the circular strategies advance, challenges with information flow, tracking solutions, and practical designated uses limit the effectiveness of the strategies targeted at managing waste generated from construction and demolition activities [16,17]. Contingent on the growth of Industry 4.0 technologies, opportunities have emerged through digital, automation, and smart technologies to develop and deploy innovative tools that solve the persisting problems in construction waste management [2,7]. One of these is the material passport—a tool with significant potential to enhance construction waste management practices.
Material Passports are described as a digital interface for documenting the certified identity of specific products alongside their aggregated life cycle data [18]. Material passports systematically document a product’s technical and operational characteristics while tracking its physical condition throughout the entire lifecycle, from manufacturing to decommissioning [19,20]. In recent years, the concept of material passports has grown and received increased focus from researchers across diverse contexts [21,22,23].
The study of Rumetshofer et al. [22] explored the use of material passports to support information-based plastic material tracking. From the findings, the authors identify the criticality of physical markers, blockchain, and digital product passwords to support implementation processes. In the study of Honic et al. [19], a proof-of-concept was demonstrated for material passports to enhance the recycling potential of buildings in Austria. The findings highlight improved recyclability performance of selected building materials. Through an empirical survey, the study of Gasue et al. [23] investigated the issues in material passport implementation, including awareness levels, willingness to adopt, perceived challenges, and strategies from a developing country’s perspective. The results suggested that while awareness was low, industry stakeholders showed high adoption potential if the supporting infrastructure was provided. The study of Van Capelleveen et al. [18] further investigated the general anatomy, definitions, and uncertainties of material passports as applied across disciplines. The findings showed that while different terminologies existed in describing material passports, a unified core conceptual understanding was common and critical in how the tool was developed and deployed.
With an increasing focus on the development of material passports in recent years, an investigation into the advances made, particularly in construction waste management functions, is imperative to support and accelerate future research. Understanding the key application contexts and methods, the relevant actors, requirements, and critical challenges is instrumental for successful implementation in the construction industry.
This paper, therefore, aims to contribute to a better understanding of the application of material passports in construction waste management through a systematic review of the existing literature. The following objectives are established to assist in achieving the aim: (i) to identify the key contexts and use cases of material passports in construction waste management; (ii) to identify the main actors and stakeholders in implementation; (iii) to identify the critical data and infrastructure requirements for implementation; and (iv) to identify the existing challenges in implementation. The rest of the paper is structured as follows: Section 2 provides an overview of material passports, Section 3 describes the methodology in detail, Section 4 presents the results of the bibliometric and content analysis from the selected papers, Section 5 provides a discussion of the implications of the results and future work, and Section 6 presents the conclusion and summaries of the findings, limitations, and recommendations.

2. Overview of Material Passports

Material passports store records and track performance properties of a product, including its physical lifecycle condition over the lifespan from production to end-of-life [19,20]. The study of Van Capelleveen et al. [18] further describes material passports as a digital interface for the documentation of the certified identity of a specific product alongside its aggregated life cycle data. Thereby facilitating the evaluation of the product’s circularity and sustainability potential as well as its economic and reusability value. In the construction context, material passports provide a comprehensive stock of components, materials, and the condition of building elements, to enhance reuse and recycling at end-of-life. Essentially creating a “bank” of the construction materials and components from a building stock [24,25]. By developing a continuously updated lifecycle log of functional building components in a material passport, stakeholders can infer optimal repurposing, recycling, and reuse strategies, hence minimizing the waste generated at the end of the building’s lifecycle.
Different frameworks and approaches have been developed for material passports. For instance, Figure 1 illustrates an adaptation of the proposed digital material passport framework by Markuo et al. [26]. The proposed framework integrates BIM, Artificial intelligence (AI), and automated tracking solutions to develop an information-rich material passport. This is built of similar material passport frameworks like the Waterman Material Passport [27], and attempts to bridge the gap with static documentation and manual data input processes. Generally, the material passports are developed to suit the specific use cases. However, the function of carrying continuous lifecycle information is core and present across different iterations of material passports. In the general context of construction waste management, there is a lack of dedicated research focus that investigates the application of material passports. The subsequent sections of the paper report on a systematic review of existing cases to uncover the contexts, stakeholders, requirements, and challenges in applying material passports in construction waste management.

3. Methodology

This paper applies a systematic review approach to identify, analyze, and report the relevant findings on the application of material passports to minimize waste in the construction industry. This study adopts a multi-staged approach, which commenced with a preliminary search on the underlying topic to identify key terminologies and facilitate an expanded literature search process. After identifying relevant keywords, a search for potential papers was undertaken. Both Scopus and the Web of Science databases were used to identify relevant papers to reduce the risk of bias. As previous review studies [28,29,30,31] recommended, the two databases are trustworthy and provide the latest and most up-to-date records of indexed academic publications. Multiple search strings were applied to retrieve an extensive set of candidate papers. Details of the search and results are presented in Table 1.
The search was limited to the “Title”, “Abstract”, and “Keywords” sections of papers. Subsequently, 177 results were retrieved, merged, and exported into Excel for further screening and selection. A first-stage screening of the “Title” and “Abstracts” was undertaken to filter the records. The selections from the first-stage screening were then taken through a second-stage screening, where the “full texts” of the papers are retrieved and screened to confirm eligibility for inclusion in the review. Snowballed papers, identified outside the initial search results, were similarly screened and included in the final selected articles.
To aid the screening process and reduce selection bias, the selected articles had to meet the inclusion criteria of (a) the paper must have a materials passport context, and (b) the paper must have a building construction or demolition waste management context. To further minimize the bias in the eligibility of the selected papers, a quality assessment of the articles was undertaken as applied by Singh et al. [32] to ensure the following conditions were fully/partially met in the paper (i) clear objectives stated, (ii)adequate description of research method, (iii) discussion of material passport applications, and/or requirements (data, infrastructure), and/or stakeholders, and/or challenges in adoption. No quantitative scores were assigned in this process. A total of thirty-five (35) papers were selected to be included in the final review. The PRISMA flowchart from Figure 2 provides a summary of the process. Two (2) reviewers were involved in the data extraction process to identify the contexts, stakeholders, data and infrastructure requirements, and challenges in implementing material passports for construction waste management as discussed in the selected papers. Microsoft Excel Spreadsheets were used to categorize and generate summaries of the data points extracted in tables and charts.

4. Results and Discussion

This section provides a detailed description and discussion of the results of the data extracted from the selected papers included in the review. The first part outlines the bibliometric information, including the publication trends and keyword co-occurrence analysis. The second part reports on the content analysis, which includes the contexts, stakeholders, requirements, and challenges in the application of material passports in construction waste management.

4.1. Bibliometric Information

4.1.1. Publication Trend

An increasing trend in publications on material passports and construction waste management is observed from the results presented in Figure 3. A significant growth in publications is identified between 2022 and 2025, contributing 23 (65.71%) papers, while 12 (34.29%) papers are identified between 2018 and 2021. The selected papers articles comprised 20 (57.14%) journals, 13 (37.14%) conference papers, and 2 (5.71%) book chapters. Of these, 22 (62.86%) constitute case studies/prototypes, 11 (31.43%) constitute reviews, and 2 (5.71%) constitute empirical surveys/interviews. The rising trend in publications signals growing interest in using material passports for construction waste management. The concept of material passports has evolved over the years, and its potential use in the construction industry is attributed to minimizing waste generated from the construction and the end-of-life process of buildings. While the general publication sample remains limited, advancement in prototype-based studies provides an avenue for systematic review into development approaches, identifying critical implementation factors, and future areas for improvement. A summary of the selected articles is provided in Table 2.

4.1.2. Keyword Co-Occurrence Analysis

A map of the co-occurrences between all keywords from the selected articles was developed using VOSViewer Software Version 1.6.18.0. VOSViewer is a popularly recommended open-sourced software that provides an easy-to-use interface for analyzing and visualizing bibliometric data [61,62].
Following the identification of duplicate keywords, a thesaurus function is deployed to merge and eliminate duplicates and redundancies where necessary. This improved the clustering algorithm and allowed for significant connections to be effectively mapped for clarity in underlying relationships. The results of the co-occurrence analysis are presented in Figure 4. From the analysis, five (5) significant clusters are identified related to material passports, the circular economy and digital technologies (green), building stock and end-of-life activities (red), construction waste management and trading (purple), building sustainability and lifecycle assessment (blue), and building lifecycle design information tracking (yellow).
The keywords “material passports”, “circular economy”, and “construction industry” emerged as the most prominent connection nodes. The main keywords showed strong clustering connections with other keywords including “construction waste”, “waste management”, “cross-border trading”, “architectural design”, “life cycle”, “building information modeling” “demolition”, “decision-making”, “digital technologies”, “material banks”, “building stocks” among others. The findings from the keyword co-occurrence results corroborate the increasing publication trends and interest in applying material passports to minimize waste in the construction industry.

4.2. Context of Studies

As illustrated in Figure 5, the context of studies in material passports for construction waste management is classified into “buildings and cities as material banks”, “integrated digital technologies and methods”, “reusable designs, prefabricated and modular buildings”, “waste management and trading”, and “awareness, benefits, and strategies”. The identified contexts are discussed further.

4.2.1. Buildings and Cities as Materials Banks

The concepts of “buildings as materials banks” (BAMB) and “cities as materials banks” (CAMB) are the most popular use cases identified in the implementation of material passports for construction waste management. The results show that the majority of the selected papers focused on both BAMB [8,19,56] and CAMB concepts [40,54]. The BAMB and CAMB concepts consider buildings and cities as a future stock of valuable components and materials, which can be maintained in value, recovered, and repurposed into various products at the end of their effective service life [21,36]. Using material passports as a digital identifier to store product lifecycle information and inform end-of-life reuse strategies is instrumental in implementing these concepts. At the building level, Rose and Stegemann [21] reviewed component reuse potentials and proposed the need for an effective information system strategy. At the city level, Tsui et al. [54] investigated how the spatial parameters influence the location of circular construction hubs, which can be used to warehouse and redistribute waste products within the construction supply chain. Consequently, material passports are developed in the studies of Sauter et al. [37], Honic et al. [19,48], and Frietas et al. [55] to demonstrate high recoverability, urban mining potential, and reduced waste generation and environmental impacts in the built environment.

4.2.2. Integrated Digital Technologies and Methods

A wide range of integrated digital technology applications are identified in the development of material passports. These include Building Information Modeling (BIM) [24,44,45], Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) [34,38], Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) [52], and blockchain [33,43]. Developing digital twins of building materials and components enhances information and data granularity in material passports. Through the integration of BIM, VR, and AR tools in modeling and storing as-built physical models of structures, the overall inventory database of the material passports is enriched and can improve the accuracy of lifecycle monitoring and analytics [24,34]. Similarly, using RFIDs in communication and tracking material flow is essential in developing real-time identification of component locations and data reporting with other sensory Internet of Things (IoTs) in the network [52]. Blockchain advances the decentralization of ledger data management and facilitates the creation of unique and immutable material passport records verifiable by all stakeholders in a transacting network [33].

4.2.3. Reusable Designs, Prefabricated, and Modular Buildings

An increasing growth of reusable designs has been identified in several studies [24,34,46]. The concept aims at standardizing and developing early-stage designs with end-of-life reuse in mind to facilitate ease of deconstruction and component interchangeability among similarly designed building types. In application, the concept follows some principles of design for manufacture, assembly, and disassembly, and in some identified cases, it has been tested on prefabricated and modular buildings [38,49]. The integration of these concepts is well-conceived as prefabrication offers a practical approach to the mass production of standardized units and thus offers the like-for-like interchangeability of manufactured components in similar building designs. Material passports help create and store identification, lifecycle, and tracking records of these standardized components and designs, which can be used to map recovery strategies and best-case building reuse matches within a circular economy.

4.2.4. Waste Management and Trading

Streamlined sorting, treatment, and trading of waste products are critical in reducing the impact of construction waste on the environment. Studies have been identified with a primary focus on upcycling [47,57] and waste trading [33,42] of materials like rubble and soil waste. For both salvageable and non-salvageable materials, using material passports to track the movement of the waste across the value chain from different stakeholders helps in planning and coordinating the final destinations and designated use of the products. Construction waste trading offers opportunities to identify market demand for waste products with utility within and outside the industry, thereby reducing the rate of waste landfilling and associated environmental impacts.

4.2.5. Awareness, Benefits, Challenges, Strategies

The studies of Abuhalimeh et al. [50], Gasue et al. [23], and Dar Amer et al. [58] explored the awareness levels, stakeholder perceptions, benefits, strategies, and challenges in effectively implementing material passports to support construction waste management. The identification of such influential factors for material passport implementation is foundational to understanding ecosystem dynamics and contextualizes the feasibility of implementation strategies. For instance, in the study by Gasue et al. [23], the findings highlight a low level of awareness of material passports in the Ghanaian construction industry and a high willingness to adopt if adequate infrastructure requirements were provided. From these findings, stakeholders can first develop promotional and educational strategies to sensitize and build professional capacity, after which resources can be directed towards mass industrial implementation.

4.3. Stakeholders

The scope of stakeholders identified is classified into “Asset Owners and Managers”, “Design, Construction, and Deconstruction Teams”, “Manufacturers, Suppliers, and Logistics Providers”, “Waste Management Operators”, “Technology Providers and Developers”, “Sustainability Experts and Researchers”, “Policy, Regulator, and Government“, and “Financial Intermediaries”. The details of the findings are discussed further in this section.

4.3.1. Asset Owners and Managers

Building and construction projects originate from a “client” and therefore form part of the primary team of stakeholders. Typically, the clients double as the asset owners or may appoint facility managers to operate the building post-completion [63]. Their role in sustaining the implementation of material passports is linked to managing the record-keeping over the operational lifecycle of the building and ensuring accurate logs of maintenance are kept in the passport [33,37,52]. Considering the significance of this function to the effectiveness of the material passport, it is critical to involve asset owners and managers in the development process to understand the practicality of specific data reporting tasks and effective operational strategies to minimize the chances of failure.

4.3.2. Design, Construction, and Deconstruction Teams

Most of the material and component information is readily accessible to the design and construction teams in the early lifecycle stages; hence, they play a key role in developing material passports. On one hand, the architects, engineers, and building contractors involved in the design can ensure the comprehensive catalog of requisite information for instantiating the material passports [24,40,52]. Their roles can also extend to include the development of an effective design schema to facilitate optimal placement of tracking tags in building components and materials. On the other hand, the material and component recovery process at the end-of-life phase requires practical engineering methods to effectively disassemble essential elements with little to no loss in value [24,46,59]. Thus, expert deconstruction and demolition teams have to be engaged to develop optimal end-of-life protocols, which can be integrated into the material passports for building components to inform recovery strategies at the end-of-life.

4.3.3. Manufacturers, Suppliers, and Logistics Providers

In different jurisdictions, material vendors and subcontractors are typically burdened with extended producer responsibility, which mandates them to track and ensure efficient end-use of wastes from their main products and auxiliary products [3]. In the context of material passports, tracking products from origin provides the end-users with essential sustainability information from the production inputs and processes used to manufacture the product [53,59]. In addition, the diverse logistics requirements for various products and the input of logistics providers in supporting handling and tracking within the supply chain significantly add value to the provenance tracking capability built into material passports.

4.3.4. Waste Management Operators

Experts in waste management provide vital input on end-of-life solutions and capabilities for end-use products. Understanding how various waste products are treated and upcycled can provide insights into how building components and materials can be engineered to meet end-of-life processing requirements [19,33]. Furthermore, waste treatment and recycling facility operators can best determine and manage the technological and resource requirements for processing and developing secondary products from waste. Their involvement in the material passport implementation can significantly benefit the engineering of tracking tools and tags, which may facilitate effective sorting and processing of waste material composites [52].

4.3.5. Technology Providers and Developers

Numerous technology applications are adopted in planning, coordinating, assessing, monitoring, and reporting information exchanged between material passports over the construction supply chain [43]. It is therefore imperative to provide robust technology platforms to support data exchange and communication. To ensure practical and successful deployment of the passports, technology solutions providers can conduct a needs assessment of supply chain requirements to effectively map out hubs for system integration to facilitate seamless data exchange and updates into the material passports [34,37,38]. Furthermore, their expertise can be used in developing programs, software tools, and plugins in addition to the hardware requirements of the material passport.

4.3.6. Sustainability Experts and Researchers

Assessing the environmental impact of waste products requires technical expertise across all sectors in the construction supply chain. The input of sustainability experts and researchers is vital in developing an understanding of the whole lifecycle impact, costs, trade-offs, and benefits of end-of-life opportunities to optimize decision-making [23,55]. Furthermore, research and development teams develop innovative product use and recovery protocols that deliver the optimal outcomes in waste reduction targets.

4.3.7. Policy, Regulators, and Government

Regulations and standards provide structure and consistency for effectively implementing material passports in the construction industry. Thus, policymakers, regulators, and governance supervision experts offer valuable input for streamlining material passport implementation strategies to meet explicit and implied local regulatory requirements [33,55]. As suggested by Honic et al. [48], the development of regulatory frameworks has commenced in some European Union jurisdictions to standardize sustainability reporting. Also considering the fact that waste facilities are managed at the municipal level, the role of local government actors (e.g., environmental impact agencies) is critical in ensuring compliance with the material recovery strategies.

4.3.8. Financial Intermediaries

While the direct involvement of the financial providers is rarely explored in material passport development, their integration into the trading market can optimize payment flows among stakeholders. Particularly in providing insurance and warranty schemes for certified recycled products [24,33]. These inputs could stimulate consumer confidence in purchasing recycled products, considering some level of insurance guarantees returns or replacements in the event of defects and unplanned failures.

4.4. Data Requirements

To support the creation of material passports, specific categories and types of data are collected to keep comprehensive product records. The categories of data types discussed in the selected studies are identified and reported in Figure 6 including “Material and Component Data”, “Building Stock and Classification Data”, “Lifecycle History and Supply Chain Data”, “Deconstruction, Handling and End-of-life Data”, “Economic Data”, and “Environmental and Circularity Data”.

4.4.1. Material and Component Data

Material passports carry essential data on product properties, qualities, and attributes that uniquely identify various products. Therefore, collecting data on building materials and component properties for material passports in construction waste management applications is critical. Primary material information, including names, types, lifespan, and geometric properties like dimensions and quantities, can be collected and stored in structured templates [26,59]. In addition, data on composite materials, chemical, mechanical, and biological properties can also be included in the database [60]. Depending on how the material passport is structured, different stakeholders may be responsible for providing specific data inputs.

4.4.2. Building Stock and Classification Data

The data on building stock and classification taxonomies of constituent materials characterize the product inventories and can provide high-level insights into groups, catalogs, and families of materials and components as available in the “building materials bank” [21,25,44]. Building-level data could also feed into city-level data to inform decision-making on stock availabilities for urban mining, identify potential market demands, and control resource consumption patterns.

4.4.3. Lifecycle History and Supply Chain Data

From the source of origin to final end-use, there is a continuous transfer of ownership, maintenance responsibility, and different state conditions over the product lifecycle. Keeping a historical record of use and lifecycle conditions in the material passports can inform future use, maintenance, and recycling measures to ensure that the product operates within expected performance requirements [59,60]. Furthermore, logistics tracking data should be readily available in the material passport for real-time product transit and movement updates within the supply chain and delivery network [52].

4.4.4. Deconstruction, Handling, and End-of-Life Data

Specialized equipment and methods are required to recover components and materials at the end-of-life stage. Given the lengthy lifetimes of building assets, having a record of the designed requirements for deconstruction, disassembly, and handling helps optimize the process and minimize the damage and loss of value of the recovered products [41,60]. Furthermore, data on the designated end-of-life use or treatment measures can inform stakeholders of the appropriate post-recovery measures to be adopted.

4.4.5. Economic Data

Value and price data can be integrated into material passports to facilitate economic analysis of building and material stocks [53,60]. Furthermore, the value of recovered products in secondary markets has to be ascertained to determine the financial viability of recovery and recycling strategies to be adopted. Including product price history information in the material passport also provides transparency for stakeholder negotiations.

4.4.6. Environmental and Circularity Data

The inclusion of environmental impact data and circularity potential in material passports fits into environmental reporting requirements in the circular economy and sustainability [42,44,48]. Clarity on the impacts of the products and processes in the supply chain is essential to determining hotspots and contributory processes with potential impact reduction opportunities. Furthermore, the environmental trade-offs in reuse or disposal strategies can be comparatively assessed to inform optimal decision-making.

4.5. Infrastructure Requirements

Similarly, essential tools, technologies, and physical infrastructure requirements are needed to support the development and operation of material passports. These are categorized and reported in Figure 7 to include “Modelling and Analytical Tools”, “Sensory, Tracking, and Monitoring Systems”, “Digital Inventories and Databases”, “Physical Storage and Recycling Hubs”, “Secured Common Data Environment”, and “Trading and Payment Solutions”.

4.5.1. Modeling and Analytical Tools

Hardware and software tools for modeling and analytical processes are essential in the development of material passports. Integrated digital technology tools are crucial in streamlining the data exchange [43,51]. With the appropriate tools, complex models, analytics, and interactions in the construction waste supply chain can be simulated to inform optimal design choices and requirements that meet the waste management objective.

4.5.2. Sensory, Tracking, and Monitoring Systems

The use of IOT devices like RFID, lasers, and thermal scanners interacts to provide real-time data input for material passports at various stages of the lifecycle [26,52]. It is therefore imperative to identify technological integration needs and provide the required infrastructure to prevent lags and fragmentation in data flow into the material passport.

4.5.3. Digital Inventories and Databases

Storing and exchanging large-scale construction and building information is a “big data problem” and thus requires sufficient digital/cloud storage capabilities over an extended lifespan [33,45]. Furthermore, integrating online product inventories and environmental databases is key to supporting material passport functions [44,48]. These storage requirements must be carefully planned to support the material passport beyond the estimated service life of the products.

4.5.4. Physical Storage and Recycling Hubs

On one hand, extensive warehousing facilities are required for storing end-use products, considering the spatial volumes of the components and materials used in buildings [36,40]. On the other hand, technical requirements and processing logistics are critical to process recovered end-use products into storage hubs. The storage hubs have to be strategically located to optimize the movement and flow of products and minimize the costs and delivery times.

4.5.5. Secured Common Data Environment

Many construction management studies have promoted the need for a single source of truth (SSOT) [64,65]. This is no exception in material passports. The SSOT in information exchange is required to ensure transparency in reporting and maintain stakeholder trust in the data from material passports. Integrating technologies like BIM cloud allows multiple project stakeholders to interact and share necessary information, which could benefit material passport development [44]. However, scaling the implementation may require more open-sourced and mainstream tools that may come with extra security requirements. Therefore, using decentralized blockchain-based platforms is recommended to secure material passport records and make them tamper-proof.

4.5.6. Trading and Payment Solutions

Developing a market for sourcing and purchasing reusable items is crucial in deepening the mainstream demand for waste and end-use products [24,33]. These solutions can include web-based marketplaces and integrated payment systems that make trading convenient between stakeholders.

4.6. Challenges to Implementation

Various challenges limiting the implementation of material passports are discussed. These are categorized and reported in Figure 8 to include “Data Management and Protection Challenges”, “Financial Challenges”, “Technological Challenges”, “Standardization and Certification Challenges”, “Stakeholder Challenges”, “Supply Chain and Logistics Challenges”, and “Market Maturity and Demand Challenges”.

4.6.1. Data Management and Protection Challenges

One of the biggest challenges is the availability and access to the data for the material passport [42,55,60]. In addition, the accuracy and level of detail of the data are limited in many instances, as the right tools for monitoring and reporting are not widely adopted or integrated in the industry [41,50]. Manual processing and data management are key contributing factors to this challenge. Furthermore, protecting data ownership and privacy is lacking in some instances [51,57].

4.6.2. Financial Challenges

The cost implications of developing and deploying material passports are a critical challenge to their adoption [38,40,58]. The cost of engaging personnel and purchasing proprietary software in system management disincentivizes stakeholder adoption, especially when the technology is still nascent and not yet mainstream in industry practice. Furthermore, with end-use markets still immature, the upfront investment costs of approaches like reusable designs are challenging to justify in a very profit-driven industry.

4.6.3. Technological Challenges

Navigating various technological tools deployed at multiple levels in the supply chain limits the implementation of material passports. Considering each stakeholder is unique and employs tailored technology solutions to meet their needs, the interoperability of such systems with one another in the supply chain can be difficult [24,43,53]. Furthermore, the practicality of embedding tracking tools and materials can pose a challenge, considering the extreme environments within which construction is undertaken [52]. Ensuring the durability of embedded technologies and the connectivity of multi-sensory devices are challenging engineering problems that require expert solutions. These technological challenges further highlight the current gap in integrating environmental assessment tools like life cycle assessment in design decision-making and sustainable material selection.

4.6.4. Standardization and Certification Challenges

Given the nascent nature of material passport technology, standards in their development and deployment are lacking, leaving several inconsistencies and gaps in implementation [38,39,49]. Early industry adopters and researchers have thus resorted to creating independent protocols that meet organizational capabilities. This creates potential incompatibilities and unscalable frameworks across the supply chain. Additionally, standard performance benchmarks and certification requirements for reusable materials and components are lacking, further limiting the use of salvaged products in the industry.

4.6.5. Stakeholder Challenges

Mainstreaming novel concepts and technologies requires a critical mass of consensus and collaboration among stakeholders, which has been difficult in many cases. One of the most challenging aspects is outright resistance to change, especially without an external catalyst [24,50,58]. Even though a first-mover advantage exists in market development, the perceived risks of loss tend to outweigh the perceived benefits of investment in the initial stages. Furthermore, in a competitive industry, the lack of trust in collaboration among stakeholders limits the formation of strong movements to drive change and promote the adoption of material passports.

4.6.6. Supply Chain and Logistics Challenges

Streamlining the physical and digital logistics in implementing material passports presents unique challenges. First, recovering complex components from buildings requires a unique set of expertise to ensure the value of products is not diminished ([24,56]). Second, transporting, recycling, and storing products until reuse requires significant physical infrastructure, which can be costly to develop and challenging to manage.

4.6.7. Market Maturity and Demand Challenges

In the evolving ecosystem of circular materials and component reuse, demand for recycled products is still limited. Aside from using basic materials like debris in secondary products, efforts are being promoted to recover complex whole-unit structural components like wall panels, which can be reused in other buildings. Considering this secondary reuse market is underdeveloped and nascent, the demand for these products remains limited [8,35,53]. Furthermore, aggregating practical needs, product-market fit, and building stock availability through material passports is challenging, as centralized trading mechanisms and platforms are non-existent.

5. Implications and Future Work

A summary of the results discussed is provided in Figure 9. A number of implications are further discussed in this section alongside potential areas for future research focus.

5.1. Practicality of Material Passport in Managing Construction Waste

While different approaches have been identified for applicability across the lifecycle. As observed from the case studies, the general concept of tying material passports to building materials, components, designs, and waste trading appears to be the most practical in the near term. Considering limitations with the maturity of integrated technological tools across the supply chain, material passports may best be deployed as “static” tools with regularly maintained logs. The process data and lifecycle data collected from each stakeholder can be consolidated into the central record, across the product lifecycle, to inform future designated uses and trading negotiations. Stakeholders are identified to have a strong influence; however, their inherent lack of collaboration, trust, and resistance to change is a weakness that limits the mass adoption of material passports in construction waste management. In addition, while data and infrastructure requirements are fundamental for developing robust material passports, the challenges with protection, cost, and interoperability across the construction supply chain limit the extent to which material passports can be implemented.

5.2. Enhancing Trust with Standardization and Regulations

With the current lack of global standardization, regulation, and certification, the data collected in independently developed passports is prone to inconsistency. Notwithstanding the absence of global standards, localized material processing and waste reporting guidelines can be developed and mandated for adoption across industries through regulatory policy. These actions can be helpful in sensitizing early stakeholder participation and galvanizing critical mass adoption of material passports in the construction supply chain.

5.3. Integrating Automation and Artificial Intelligence Tools

As automation and artificial intelligence tools become popular in the construction industry, there exists a need to integrate with material passports to keep up with the pace of data analytics and reporting. Furthermore, advanced predictive modeling and analysis can be undertaken with artificial intelligence tools to enhance end-of-life reuse decisions. Subsequently, automated real-time monitoring and reporting can reduce manual processing, leading to optimized data management for material passports.

5.4. Economic Viability of End-of-Life Products

More focus can be given to developing advanced end-of-life use cases and processes to increase the economic value of recovered products. These can span a wide array of solutions, including connection and disassembly techniques for prefabricated building components, interchangeable design elements, component standardization, and vertical integration across other industries to increase reuse potential. The better the business case benefits are, the greater the incentive for stakeholders to adopt, thus increasing the use of material passports for product provenance tracking.

5.5. Decentralizing Trading Hubs and Market Accessibility

Opening up market avenues for trading end-of-life and reusable products can accelerate the adoption of material passports in the construction industry. Currently, these markets remain underdeveloped in many countries and are inaccessible to stakeholders. Bringing the platforms closer to the end user and facilitating end-to-end integration with organizational tools and infrastructure is a viable way of encouraging stakeholder participation and promoting the use of materials passports.

6. Conclusions

A systematic review approach was adopted to identify, analyze, and report the contexts, stakeholders, requirements, and challenges in using material passports in construction waste management. A bibliometric analysis of the selected papers showed an increasing number of publications on the topic, though still nascent. A trend and keyword co-occurrence analysis further highlighted strong concept clustering with “circular economy”, “construction waste”, “waste management”, “cross-border trading”, “architectural design”, “life cycle”, “building information modeling” “demolition”, “decision-making”, “digital technologies”, “material banks”, “building stocks” among others.
The findings from the content analysis showed that, aside from studies exploring the general awareness, benefits, and challenges, there are significant contextual use cases in building and cities as a material bank, waste management and trading, integrated digital technologies, reusable designs, prefabricated and modular buildings. Key stakeholders in the implementation process include asset owners, waste management operators, construction and deconstruction teams, technology providers, regulatory authorities, and sustainability experts.
Key data requirements include material, components, building stock data, lifecycle flow, supply chain data, environmental impact data, deconstruction, and handling data, among others. In addition, the key infrastructure requirements are modeling and analytical tools, sensory tracking tools, digital and physical storage hubs, and collaborative information exchange systems. While progress is evident, challenges are still identified with data management, costs, process standardization, technology, stakeholder collaboration, market demand, and supply chain logistics.
The implications of the findings from this study are influential in the development of material passports for construction waste management applications.
First, from a theoretical perspective, the identification of contexts, key stakeholders, requirements, and challenges contributes to the academic discourse on the subject matter and provides fresh perspectives on material passport uses. Secondly, from a practical and managerial perspective, it has been highlighted that the most adopted use cases involve the use of the BAMB and CAMB concepts, thus suggesting high viability for early-use prototypes and pilots in the buildings. Furthermore, the need to develop innovative end-use products to increase economic value and market demand is established. This informs organizations to invest in R&D to develop new products, particularly for prefabricated buildings. Thirdly, from a regulatory and policy perspective, there is an established need for standardized protocols and procedures to guide stakeholders in adopting and implementing material passports in construction waste management. Governance authorities can explore strategies to roll out effective policies within the existing waste management framework that not only regulate but also promote, sensitize, and incentivize stakeholders towards critical mass adoption of material passports.
This study has some limitations regarding scope and case availability. Given the nascent nature of research on material passports, even fewer case studies focus specifically on construction waste management. It is therefore recommended that future research work develop more case-based applications to contribute to the understanding of technological specifications and implementation workflows. In addition, further research into automation, standardization protocols, market trading, and innovative end-use products holds great potential for shaping the implementation practices of material passports and can contribute to effective waste minimization and management in the built environment.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, L.M.M., P.A.-A., S.F. and S.T.N.; Methodology, L.M.M., P.A.-A., S.F. and S.T.N.; Software, L.M.M. and P.A.-A.; Validation, L.M.M. and P.A.-A.; Formal analysis, L.M.M. and P.A.-A.; Investigation, L.M.M. and P.A.-A.; Writing—original draft preparation, L.M.M. and P.A.-A.; Writing—review and editing, L.M.M., P.A.-A., S.F. and S.T.N.; Visualization, L.M.M. and P.A.-A.; Supervision, P.A.-A., S.F. and S.T.N.; Project administration, P.A.-A. and S.T.N.; Funding acquisition, P.A.-A. and S.T.N. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This work was supported by the Green Tech Fund (GTF) of the Environment and Ecology Bureau of Hong Kong (Grant No.: GTF202110158), the General Research Fund (GRF) of the Hong Kong Research Grants Council (Grant No.: GRF11209123), and the Early Mid-Career Research Grant of the Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology, University of Adelaide (Grant No.: 13137501).

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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Figure 1. Digital Material Passport Framework. Adapted from Markou et al. [26].
Figure 1. Digital Material Passport Framework. Adapted from Markou et al. [26].
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Figure 2. PRISMA Flowchart.
Figure 2. PRISMA Flowchart.
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Figure 3. Annual Publication Trend of Selected Papers.
Figure 3. Annual Publication Trend of Selected Papers.
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Figure 4. Keyword Co-occurrence Map of Selected Papers.
Figure 4. Keyword Co-occurrence Map of Selected Papers.
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Figure 5. Contexts of Material Passport in Construction Waste Management Studies.
Figure 5. Contexts of Material Passport in Construction Waste Management Studies.
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Figure 6. Data Requirements in the Implementation of Material Passport for Construction Waste Management.
Figure 6. Data Requirements in the Implementation of Material Passport for Construction Waste Management.
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Figure 7. Infrastructure Requirements in the Implementation of Material Passport for Construction Waste Management.
Figure 7. Infrastructure Requirements in the Implementation of Material Passport for Construction Waste Management.
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Figure 8. Challenges in the Implementation of Material Passport for Construction Waste Management.
Figure 8. Challenges in the Implementation of Material Passport for Construction Waste Management.
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Figure 9. Summary of Key Findings.
Figure 9. Summary of Key Findings.
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Table 1. Keyword Search Strings.
Table 1. Keyword Search Strings.
StringKeywordsScopusWeb of
Science
1(construction OR demolition) AND (waste) AND (“material passport”)3913
2(“material passport” OR “material bank” OR “digital passport” OR “building passport” OR “circularity passport” OR “waste passport” OR “recycling passport” OR “resource passport”) AND (“construction and demolition waste” OR “construction waste” OR “building waste” OR “demolition waste” OR “CDW” OR “C&DW”)267
3(“material passport” OR “material bank” OR “digital passport” OR “building passport” OR “circularity passport” OR “waste passport” OR “recycling passport” OR “resource passport”) AND (“construction and demolition waste” OR “construction waste” OR “building waste” OR “demolition waste” OR “CDW” OR “C&DW” OR “waste”)7418
Table 2. Summary of Selected Papers.
Table 2. Summary of Selected Papers.
NAuthorsContextType
S1Bertin et al. [24]BIM-based building as a material bank for structural element reuseJP, CSP
S2Wu et al. [33]Blockchain NFT-based material passports for construction waste tradingJP, CSP
S3Francart et al. [25]Building macro-component bank for circularityCP, CSP
S4Wibranek and Tessmann [34]Reusable building component mobile app in early-stage designCP, CSP
S5Maraqa and Spatari [35]BIM-based material passport for deconstruction and circular economyCP, CSP
S6Copeland and Bilec [36]RFID and BIM-based building as a material bank for circular economyJP, RV
S7Sauter et al. [37]Circular exchange and activities ontologies for materials circulationCP, CSP
S8Rose and Stegemann [21]Existing buildings as a material bank for building component reuse JP, RV
S9Oliveira et al. [8]Building as a material bank for construction and demolition wasteJP, RV
S10O’grady et al. [38]BIM-based prefabrication with circular economy and virtual realityCP, CSP
S11Göswein et al. [39]Circular material passports for buildingsCP, RV
S12Manelius et al. [40]Cities as material banks for reuse in the construction industryCP, CSP
S13Markou et al. [26]Methodologies for creating material passports JP, RV
S14Lopez Alvarez De Neyra and Celoza [41]Deconstruction information model-based material passports CP, RV
S15Lu et al. [42]Construction waste material passport for cross-jurisdictional tradingJP, CSP
S16Trubina et al. [43]Digital technologies in material passports for building circularityCP, RV
S17Atta et al. [44]Digitizing material passports with BIM for sustainable constructionJP, CSP
S18Topraklı [45]BIM-based material passport for construction circularityJP, CSP
S19Kim and Kim [46]Material banks in the design of reusable sustainable structuresJP, CSP
S20Cocco and Ruggiero [47]Digital materials banks for construction and demolition wasteJP; CSP
S21Gasue et al. [23]Factors in the implementation of material passportsJP; ESI
S22Honic et al. [48]Material passports for improving building recycling potentialJP, CSP
S23Yilmaz et al. [49]Material passports in modular constructionCP, CSP
S24Abuhalimeh et al. [50]Benefits and challenges of material passports for buildings at end-of-lifeCP, RV
S25Honic et al. [48]Potential and challenges of material passports for buildings at end-of-lifeJP, CSP
S26KC et al. [51]Digital technologies in material passports for circularity and net-zeroJP, RV
S27Vahidi et al. [52]RFID-based material passport for recycled concreteJP, CSP
S28Caroli [53]Soft technologies in product material passports for circular transitionCP, CSP
S29Tsui et al. [54]Spatial parameters in circular construction hubs in the built environmentJP, ESI
S30Freitas et al. [55]Building rehabilitation with circular economy principlesBC, CSP
S31Marin and De Meulder [56]Material banks to catalyze circular time flowsJP, CSP
S32Ruggiero et al. [57]Material banks for waste wood material upcycling from post-disaster areasBC, CSP
S33Dar Amer et al. [58]Challenges of material passports for buildings at end-of-lifeCP, ESI
S34Çetin et al. [59]Material passports data requirement, and availability for building circularityJP, ESI
S35Mao and Cao [60]Material passports for circularity in the construction industryJP, RV
JP: Journal Paper; BC: Book Chapter; CP: Conference Paper; RV: Reviews; ESI: Empirical Survey/Interviews; CSP: Case Studies/Prototypes.
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MDPI and ACS Style

Mankata, L.M.; Antwi-Afari, P.; Frimpong, S.; Ng, S.T. Material Passports in Construction Waste Management: A Systematic Review of Contexts, Stakeholders, Requirements, and Challenges. Buildings 2025, 15, 1825. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings15111825

AMA Style

Mankata LM, Antwi-Afari P, Frimpong S, Ng ST. Material Passports in Construction Waste Management: A Systematic Review of Contexts, Stakeholders, Requirements, and Challenges. Buildings. 2025; 15(11):1825. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings15111825

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mankata, Lawrence Martin, Prince Antwi-Afari, Samuel Frimpong, and S. Thomas Ng. 2025. "Material Passports in Construction Waste Management: A Systematic Review of Contexts, Stakeholders, Requirements, and Challenges" Buildings 15, no. 11: 1825. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings15111825

APA Style

Mankata, L. M., Antwi-Afari, P., Frimpong, S., & Ng, S. T. (2025). Material Passports in Construction Waste Management: A Systematic Review of Contexts, Stakeholders, Requirements, and Challenges. Buildings, 15(11), 1825. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings15111825

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