The circular kitchen: Perspectives for design and implementation

Global warming's impacts on ecosystems and economies underscore the urgent need for sustainability in the built environment, particularly in the housing sector, which significantly contributes to greenhouse gas emissions and material consumption. The Circular Economy (CE) presents a promising solution by minimizing resource use, environmental impact, and waste through strategies like slowing, narrowing, and closing material loops. This research focuses on developing a Circular Kitchen (CIK) as a model for circular building components. It targets Dutch Housing Associations for their market influence and long-term investments and involves other kitchen supply chain stakeholders. The study identifies four key research goals: developing a life cycle costing (LCC) method for evaluating circular components, assessing the environmental and economic performance of circular building components, deriving lessons from stakeholder choices, and examining the feasibility of circular kitchens beyond the CIK project. The findings suggest that while the CIK designs outperform standard kitchens environmentally and economically, real-world application remains challenging. Although the CIK did not reach mass implementation, the insights gained inform the development of more feasible circular building components. This research advances the understanding of CE in the built environment, providing strategies to improve the feasibility and environmental performance of circular building components.