The Renaissance of Reuse in Norway: The Future Is Back

Abstract

Society has historically valued labor and resources, including the intermediate and end products produced through them. Discarding these artifacts was seen as squandering valuable effort and resources, and waste was historically an activity to be avoided. This tradition was rapidly lost in many western countries, replaced by a more rapid linear approach whereby materials quickly went from cradle to grave in a linear system or economy. There has been a recent revival of the idea of moving back from this modern linear model, however, with increasing pressures from environmental degradation, climate change, material scarcity, and population growth. The recent resurgence in interest in circularity in Norway is assessed with an eye toward potential pitfalls, based on the past 75 years of modern building methods. How can society expect to move away from the linear approach if the buildings themselves were created within that paradigm?