In a seminar organised by the Latvian Construction Association on the use of recycled materials and recovered materials in the production of new products, especially in the construction sector, experts and entrepreneurs concluded that the circularity would be promoted by awareness of customers, demand for such materials, clarity of rules and processes, cost-effectiveness and motivation for sustainable building.
When addressing the event, Gints Miķelsons, Chairman of the Board of the Latvian Construction Association, said: "The amount of construction waste in Latvia is hundreds of thousands of tonnes. The question today is what can we do more to improve not only the accounting system, but also the circulation system, to use resources sustainably. There is a need to reconcile construction and environmental regulation, and in Waste to Resources we are doing this at construction industry level, not only in research but also in practice."
Ms Brigita Vīksne, project manager and DGNB consultant on building sustainability, presented the progress of the project and pointed out that two pilot projects - a demolition project and a new building intent project - are planned for the near future and will be implemented using the principles of circularity. The biggest challenge is to motivate clients to take on such resource-intensive projects to build experience and examples of good practice.

Ms Rudīte Vesere, Director of the Environmental Protection Department of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Regional Development, urged to look at the established triangle of cooperation between the public administration, clients and construction stakeholders as a circle without sharp corners. "There are enough doers in Latvia, also producers of sustainable materials, but often we are too modest and do not talk about it widely. Therefore, the experience and practical issues of companies can serve as inspiration and encouragement for others, for example, to change their approach to use of building materials and assessment of the resources used," emphasised Rudīte Vesere.
Knauf shared examples and its own experience, demonstrating the potential of possibilities for the use of gypsum as a mineral material for production of sustainable and innovative products. Clean R presented its newly opened plastics recycling plant, whose products are used in building products in addition to new packaging. Kapars Fogelmanis, the plant manager, stressed the importance of the quality of the returned material - the less impurities a sorted material contains, the more it can be recycled and used to produce other products.
Jegors Golubevs, Board Member of Schwenk Latvija, while sharing his experience in the field of ready-mixed concrete and concrete construction products, highlighted the issue of market demand for products whose quality remains unchanged by using recycled material, but whose visual appearance, such as colour, changes. Discussions also focused on what to do with the dismantled material - what are the possibilities to incorporate it into a new product.
Company Balticfloc shared its experience in producing thermal insulation material using hemp fibre and waste paper. The pilot project, funded by the European Commission's LIFE programme, is now in its final phase. The new, circular thermal insulation material has undergone the necessary calculations and tests to be CE-marked and is also in the process of being tested for the product's environmental declaration.
Company Druplat is a wood recycling company and currently recycles wooden packaging, boxes, branches, trunks, bark, furniture, as well as timber from demolition and construction work. The raw material may contain small metal parts that can be removed during processing and shredding, but it is important that there are no other impurities. In the future, the company plans to develop a new product - pallet blocks - from recycled materials, mainly wood and textiles.
Representatives of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Regional Development, the State Construction Control Bureau, the State Environmental Service, as well as representatives of construction clients participated in the seminar. Participants agreed with the idea that the inclusion of a recycling clause already in the procurement documents would contribute to circularity, as the use of recovered materials is often not considered and offered at all as a direct result of procurement requirements. For example, in road construction, there would be huge potential to use recovered materials in the construction of new railway lines as part of the materials according to technical and safety conditions.
The discussion led to the realisation that, by implementing circularity principles in construction in a fair and responsible way, the resources recovered after full sorting, testing and incorporation into a new building product can sometimes be more expensive than using primary resources. However, building a responsible construction industry for future generations requires changing current habits and using resource-efficient solutions. At the same time, issues related to the regulation of recovered material need to be addressed to ensure that the material is safe and tested, as well as education to raise awareness of the different visual characteristics of recovered material and its technical properties for building requirements.