Systematization of sustainability indicators as a tool to assist in the selection building materials by the project designer

Abstract

The process of specifying construction materials requires from professionals an increasingly broad knowledge and, when correlated to the concept of sustainability, the systematization of indicators becomes a tool of fundamental importance for the responsible choice of building materials. This investigation aims to systematize the indicators potentially applicable in a process of selection of building materials based on sustainability. For the definition of these indicators we adopted the main tools for sustainability assessment as references. For the establishment of the conceptual foundation we considered the sources with known reliability, mainly from national and international books and scientific papers. On the basis of the systematization, we established the correlation between the indicators and the environmental, economic, social and cultural dimensions of the concept of sustainability. We also made a complementary analysis pointing out the stages of the life cycle in which the indicators help to favor sustainability. As a major result, 33 indicators were listed and appraised, where a greater relation of the indicators with the environmental dimension of sustainability can be noticed. It was also observed that the indicators are correlated in a proportional manner with the stages of the life cycle, with the exception of the Use/Operation step, in which there is less manipulation of material.

Key words: sustainability indicators, building materials, materials selection.