3D PRINT E CIRCULAR ECONOMY. Innovation and sustainability for the construction sector

The uncertainty that characterizes our times, the long-term trends that are not always clearly distinguishable, the challenges posed by climate change and increasing dependence, the continuous threats to the competitiveness of our economies and the sustainability of social models require targeted strategies to manage important factors of change in the arrangement of the city and the territory, respecting the native and distinctive characteristics of the Mediterranean socio-cultural contexts, also with a view to managing emergencies generated by environmental disasters or, as the current and widespread social situation suggest, from unexpected pandemics.
In this sense, the contribution investigates the strategies that can provide an acceleration to the construction sector starting from the recovery of construction and demolition waste (C&D) and the possibility of inserting them in a reuse cycle through the current techniques of 3D Printing to the construction of low environmental impact and economically accessible buildings. It is in fact possible to start dematerialisation of activities from disused buildings and controlled demolition as a strategic moment for urban regeneration and “valorisation of waste” that returns secondary raw materials to be reused in other contexts and with innovative construction methods.