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Repairing is one of the alternative business alternatives at the end-of-life phase of clothing, that is seen to be a potential solution for the biggest challenge that the fashion industry faces today - waste. The purpose of this research is to extend our collective understanding of consumers’ value in clothes that lead to their willingness to keep a garment in use for longer. It then identifies how brands could adapt their strategy based on this understanding to better involve consumers to promote the use of clothes repair. A quantitative research design was applied using a consumer survey. The survey questions were designed according to the subjects that emerged from the literature review to answer the presented research questions. The most significant cognitive factors affecting consumers’ repair attitude and behaviour arising from the findings are emotional attachment, product properties such as quality, fashion leadership, subjective norms and awareness of the environmental impact of repair. Demographic factors of age, gender and income group moderate the impact of these factors and are useful to narrow down the strategy for the brand’s target consumers. The communication, cost, service convenience and service quality are determined to be the dominant factors in the strategy for brands offering repair service.

Bygg- och fastighetssektorn står idag för en femtedel av Sveriges klimatutsläpp. Målet från branschen är att dessa utsläpp ska minska och att branschen ska nå ett nettonollutsläpp av växthusgaser till år 2045. För att uppfylla detta mål så ses en övergång till cirkulär ekonomi och återbruk som en viktig del. Syftet med denna rapport är att undersöka vilka möjligheter och utmaningar som finns för återbruk av byggmaterialmaterial vid ändring av en byggnad samt hur bygglovskraven påverkar detta. Syftet är även att studera om det finns något som skulle underlätta för återbruk vid ändring av byggnad. Metoden som använts för att undersöka detta syfte är en litteraturstudie samt kvalitativa intervjuer med olika aktörer inom bygg- och fastighetsbranschen. Studien visar att det både finns möjligheter och utmaningar med återbruk. Där de främsta möjligheterna är att byta användningsområde för materialet eller att överdimensionera. De främsta utmaningarna som studien visar är att det saknas praxis och riktlinjer för att verifiera kvaliteten på materialet, en ökad tidsåtgång vid arbete med återbruk och brist på företag som är specialiserade på återbruk av byggmaterial. Studien visar även att de tekniska egenskapskraven påverkar återbruk men att det är lättare med återbruk vid ändring i jämförelse med vid nyproduktion då det tas hänsyn till ändringens omfattning och byggnadens förutsättningar. För att underlätta återbruk så önskas produktdeklarationer där teknisk livslängd och vägledning för återbruk finns med samt praxis och vägledning i Boverkets Byggregler. För att dra slutsatsen av vilka praxis och regler som ska tillämpas i Boverkets Byggregler behövs dock fortsatta studier där det tas hänsyn till även andra faktorer än återbruk. / Building and real estate sector currently accounts for a fifth of Sweden’s emissions. The goal is to reduce these emissions and for the sector to achieve climate neutrality 2045. To meet this goal, a transition to circular economy and recycling is seen as an important part. The purpose of this report is to examine what opportunities and challenges that exist for the reuse of building materials when changing a building and how the building permit requirements affect this. The purpose is also to study whether there is anything that would facilitate reuse when changing a building. The method used to investigate this purpose is a literature study and qualitative interviews with various actors in the construction and real estate sector. The study shows that there are both opportunities and challenges with reuse of building materials. Where the main possibilities are to change the area of use of the material or to oversize. The main challenges that the study shows are the lack of practice and guidelines for verifying the quality of the material, an increased time spent working with re-use of building materials and a lack of companies that specialize in reuse of building materials. The study also shows that the technical property requirements affect re-use, but that re-use is easier in the event of a change compared with new production, as the extent of the change and the building's conditions are considered. To facilitate re-use, product declarations are required where technical service life and guidance for recycling are included, as well as practice and guidance in Boverkets Byggregler. To draw the conclusion of which practices and rules are to be applied in the Boverkets Byggrelger however, further studies are needed where factors other than recycling are also taken into consideration. / <p>2022-06-28</p>

Background: In recent years, the amount of textile waste increased rapidly due to the fast-fashion phenomena with an increasing clothing production and a declining customer usage. Not only that one truck of clothing getting landfilled or burned every second, but also the textile production impacts the environment due to the vast amount of water, material, chemical, and energy usage. This so-called linear “take-make-waste” approach contributes significantly to the current climate crisis. One possible solution represents the circular economy to encounter the linear approach by providing concepts for recovering materials. However, to our state of knowledge, the implementation of such Circular Economy (CE) approaches is far away from their urgent necessity. Literature papers from the last years conclude with a collaboration call between all industry actors for enhancing the waste recovery stream (WRS). Since digital platforms tackled the collaboration challenge of Circular Economy in other industries, we contemplated it as an adequate digital technology tool for overcoming Textile, Apparel and Clothing (TAC) industry collaboration challenge to further strengthening the WRS. Purpose: The study aims to investigate if and how digital platforms strengthen the TAC industry's WRS. For this purpose, we shed light on different challenges within the industry-wide network, analyzed current platform functionalities, and matched challenges and functionalities to answer the research question.  Method: The study adopts an inductive qualitative approach to explore the phenomenon of digital platforms and their potential as an enabler for the textile WRS. Thereby, we took a relativism view regarding our ontological position and followed a social constructionist's epistemology. For the data collection, we used semi-structured interviews and identified potential participants with criterion and snowball sampling. In total, we conducted 14-semistructured interviews with industry actors, platform providers, and experts. For our data analysis, we oriented ourselves on the Gioia Method, an articulated grounded theory approach. Conclusion: Resulting from our findings, we identified (1) four major challenge groups that go beyond the collaboration challenge and encompass the challenge of lack of knowledge, organization of WRS, and value chain structure. Further, we outlined (2) five platform functionalities, i.e., connecting, informing, visualizing, monitoring, and consulting. By matching challenges and functionalities, we analyzed (3) the extent to which DP can strengthen WR. We concluded that many industry challenges are tackled or partly tackled by the DP functionalities. However, within some of the sub-challenges as well as the overall challenge of the value chain structure, DPs reach their limitation in strengthening the WRS. In addition, we offer (4) an overall framework of DP for the WR stream, summarized how the DP tackles the industry-wide challenges by displaying the functionalities and associated value drivers. Lastly, we provide (5) the baseline for future platform functionalities by outlining actors’ expectations and platform providers’ planned functionalities arisen by our finding.

The world’s linear economic system, operating under the make-use-dispose philosophy, creates heavy environmental issues such as resource depletion and exuberant waste creation. One industry that is strongly affiliated with these issues is the construction industry. Responsible for around 25% of global waste creation, the industry is in need of changing and circular initiatives such as waste-to-resource ones offer pathways to such a change towards sustainability. For the materialization of these initiatives, inter-organizational collaboration is an effective tool that needs to be strengthened within the industry. It has shown its ability to create sustainable business models that are more aligned with the principles of the circular economy, yet, further research into collaborative value creation is needed.   Therefore, this thesis investigates the processes of value creation in inter-organizational collaboration as well as how the value created can help facilitate waste-to-resource initiatives within the construction industry. A theoretical framework based on the Stakeholder Value Creation model and Collaborative Value Creation framework is being used to analyze empirical material stemming from semi-structured expert interviews with representatives of the construction industry. Based on the findings, the framework is adjusted by including additional value creating collaborative processes and enabling forces for the creation of waste-to-resource initiatives. Ultimately, this thesis lays out the processes creating value in inter-organizational collaboration within the construction industry as well as the waste-to-resource initiative enablers stemming from the different types of collaborative value. This is contributing to the theoretical knowledge of collaboration and value creation as well as allowing for practical application.

The construction and real estate industry is one of Sweden's largest consumers of energy andraw materials. According to figures from Boverket, the building industry was responsible for21% of Sweden's total greenhouse gas emissions in 2019. If Sweden is to fulfil its commitmentsunder the Paris Agreement and at the same time achieve the climate goals for the 2030 Agenda,resourceefficient measures are required immediately. The transition to circular economy can bea vital step in this necessary change. In circular economy, it is crucial to eliminate waste andpollutants which can be achieved by increasing efficiency and maintaining products andmaterials in a circular cycle. The aim of this study is to examine which strategies can be applied to implementing circulareconomy in the construction industry and what opportunities and obstacles they entail. I havealso investigated whether life-cycle assessment can be an effective tool for this implementation.To answer these questions, interviews have been carried through with researchers and businessrepresentatives who have extensive knowledge of sustainable construction and who arecommitted to finding solutions to combat climate change in the construction industry. Anextensive literature study has also been performed. The results indicate that there are several opportunities and sought-after measures with thecircular economy concept, of which the most significant one is its potential to increase resourceefficiency and thereby generate climate benefits. Strategies for the implementation of CEinclude methods such as circular procurement, design for deconstruction, material passports,upcycling and reversible building design. New smart business models can also generate newrevenues and create more employment opportunities. Challenges highlighted in the study are above all lack of financial incentives. For instance, inmost cases, it is at present more profitable to buy virgin than secondary materials. The lack ofspace for intermediate storage of materials to be reused is also a challenge. There is often a lackof knowledge with suppliers and customers. In addition, there are several legal issues regardingthe division of responsibilities and finally the need of more efficient policy instruments.

This Master’s thesis was done with the research group Green Leap at KTH. Green Leap is working for engaging design in sustainable development to act as a catalyst for change. A project that Green Leap has worked with is Ett bilfritt år, where families exchanged their cars for lightweight electric vehicles for a year and the changes in their behaviours were studied. The project resulted in positive experiences of the electric cargo bikes in the everyday life without owning a car. This master thesis became a concept study to investigate different possibilities of providing electric cargo bikes as a service. Research were carried out on how existing cargo bike services were conducted and user studies were conducted to get the understanding of who the users of cargo bikes were and how their needs and behaviours looked like. Through further insights from a variety of actors, five different possibilities were identified for services for the electric cargobikes. By comparing the possibilities of the various services, there was an opportunity of designing the same cargo bike for three of the services. The common hardware had a business opportunity for establishing a common platform for different purposes. Different hardware concepts were also developed during the project to facilitate the sharing of the cargo bikes. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.Carge e-bike as a service, Marcus Steenberg, KTH Green Leap, www.ettbilfrittar.se/cargo / Detta examensarbete är ett arbete utfört för forskningsgruppen Green Leap på KTH. Forskningsgruppen arbetar med att engagera design i hållbar utveckling för att verka som en katalysator för förändring. Ett projekt som Green Leap har arbetat med är Ett bilfritt år, där familjer bytte ut sina bilar mot lätta elfordon under ett års tid och deras beteendeförändringar studerades. Projektet resulterades i positiva upplevelser av fordonet lådcykel i vardagslivet utan bil. Detta examensarbete blev en konceptstudie för att undersöka olika möjligheter att tillhandahålla lådcykel som en tjänst. Det utfördes undersökningar på hur befintliga lådcykelstjänster var uppbyggda och det utfördes en användarundersökning på vilka användarna av lådcyklar var och hur deras behov och beteende såg ut. Genom ytterligare insikter från en mängd olika aktörer, kartlades fem olika möjligheter på tjänster för lådcykeln. Genom jämförelse av de olika tjänsternas möjligheter sågs en möjlighet att utforma liknande lådcyklar till tre av tjänsterna. Detta hade en affärsmässig möjlighet för att få fram en gemensam plattform för olika ändamål. Det utvecklades även olika förslag på hårdvara för att underlätta delning med en stor variation avbehov. Detta verk är licensierad under en Creative Commons Erkännande 4.0 Internationell license. Föratt ta del av en kopia av licensen besök följande http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.Carge e-bike as a service, Marcus Steenberg, KTH Green Leap, www.ettbilfrittar.se/cargo

Due to the large quantities of waste in the construction industry, a circular return packaging system is evaluated as bearers used for gypsum deliveries. The master thesis is written together with the construction company JM AB with the goal of being able to support future strategies for the development of more sustainable packaging solutions. This has been done by a comparative life cycle analysis of the current linear system of wood chips bearers, which is compared with a theoretical circular system of plastic bearers used with a return system. The two different bearers with respective processes are compared, in order to evaluate the environmental impact and further evaluate the conditions when a return system is preferable. By creating two life cycle analyses of both systems in the SimaPro computer software and comparing them with the functional unit, 50 deliveries of 42 discs of gypsum are the two different ways of delivering gypsum compared. The result shows that two returns per plastic bearer are needed to ensure that the seven selected environmental impact categories are lower than using wood chips bearers. In the sensitivity analysis, different scenarios are tested, where one conclusion of the analysis is that the type of energy used for the manufacture of the bearers is very important for the result. The discussion addresses the problem that plastic is not a renewable material, and today's conditions on construction sites result in return packaging being handled as disposables. / På grund av byggbranschens stora mängder avfall utvärderas ett cirkulärt emballagealternativ för underslag som används vid leveranser av gips. Examensarbetet görs tillsammans med byggföretaget JM AB med målet att kunna stödja framtida strategier för utveckling av mer hållbara emballagelösningar. Har gjorts genom en jämförande livscykelanalys av det nuvarande linjära systemet av träspånsunderslag vilket jämförs med ett teoretiskt cirkulärt system av plastunderslag som går igenom ett retursystem. De två olika underslagen med respektive processer ställs mot varandra för att utvärdera miljöpåverkan för att vidare bedöma under vilka förutsättningar ett retursystem är att föredra. Genom att bygga upp två livscykelanalyser av båda systemen i dataprogrammet SimaPro som jämförs genom den funktionella enheten 50 leveranser av 42 skivor gips de två olika sätten att leverera gips. Resultatet visar att det krävs två returer per plastunderslag för att de sju utvalda miljöpåverkanskategorierna ska vara lägre än för träspånsunderslagen. I känslighetsanalysen testas olika scenarion, där slutsatsen av analysen är att typen av energi som används för tillverkningen av underslagen är mycket betydelsefull för resultatet. Diskussionen tar upp problematiken med att plast inte är ett förnyelsebart material och att dagens förutsättningar på byggarbetsplatser leder till att returemballage hanteras som förbrukningsvara.

The construction of cities involves the use of land for new spaces and infrastructure. Construction on undeveloped land poses a dilemma on how to deal with the natural resources found on the construction site. Circular economy could provide guidelines on how to harness these resources, so they become products that circulate through as many cycles as possible, therefore decreasing resource consumption and waste. This research aims to explore alternatives to harness the natural materials extracted during the land clearance process of a new urban district: Sollihøgda plussby. Additionally, a new method to examine the circularity of the suggested products will be tested: the longevity indicator. The method of this thesis consists of three parts: (1) an inventory to define which natural materials are found in the construction site and their main characteristics, (2) interviews with industry experts to gain a technical insight on the possible uses for the materials, and (3) a longevity indicator to measure the circularity of the proposed uses. This research found that the forest in Avtjerna consists of Norway spruce, Scots pine and birch. The sediments are mostly humus with a turf sheet cover, while most of Avtjerna’s bedrock is categorized as rhomb porphyry lava. Norway spruce and rhomb porphyry lava have the required quality to become high-quality products for the construction industry, and they could be used directly in the project. High-quality products have longer lifetimes and more possibilities of recycling and reuse, therefore they scored higher when calculating the longevity indicator, which means a higher material retention. The other materials (Scots pine, birch, other sediments and rocks) have also possibilities of becoming products that could be used in Sollihøgda Plussby, but the longevity indicator for these materials was lower than those of Norway spruce and rhomb porphyry. Despite the usefulness of the longevity indicator to provide a preliminary assessment, this method needs to be upgraded so it incorporates other CE parameters. There should be a distinction on how many times the material is recycled, the lifetime of the recycled products, and the quality of the products obtained from the recycling process. Inventorying the natural resources on a construction site is a practice that should become common, since it allows to determine how materials can be harnessed, but also which areas should be preserved due to their ecological value. Additionally, the longevity indicator should not be used in isolation, but the environmental impacts of each suggested product should be assessed too.

Unsustainable consumption patterns and material scarcity has been recognised as one of the challenges within the European Union. To change these patterns policy makers within EU are looking towards a transitioning into circular economy. Electronics and manufacturers of energy related products is found to be important actors in this transition, due to the unsustainable trends of consumption and the materials of important contained in electronics. Energy related products are regulated by the Eco design directive (Directive 2009/125/EC) containing implementing measures on energy efficacy. Today the directive is lacking methods for assessing material efficacy in energy related products. CEN/CENELEC was 2015 requested to develop standard methods on how to assess the material efficiency aspects; durability, ability to reuse, repair, upgrade, re-manufacturabiliy, recyclability and recoverability and use of recycled content and CRM content. This study sets out to assess the adaptability of the preliminary publications of the standards on to an Ericsson radio network product. The study is divided into two parts, part one assesses the general and product specific implementation of the selected standard documents. The first parts of this study are document analysis and seven interviews used to triangulate the general opinions on the standards. In part two the study sets out to test two of the methods found in the standard documents. The study found in the collection of recycling data and rates for a small radio network product, the product had a recyclability of XX% and a recoverability of XX% and a time for disassembly of XX seconds using the suggested method eDiM. The findings of this study suggest that these standardised methods are welcomed by the telecommunications equipment manufacturer but concerns on the amount of data required, future purpose and the reliability of the assessment methods still creates worries for the future. / Ohållbara konsumtionsmönster och materialbrist har erkänts som en av de största utmaningarna inom europeiska unionen. För att förändra dessa mönster så har beslutsfattare inom EU påbörjat omställningen till den cirkulära ekonomin. Elektronik och tillverkare av energirelaterade produkter har erkänts som viktiga aktörer i denna omställning, på grund av den ohållbara konsumtionsutvecklingen under det senaste decenniet och de viktiga material som används för att tillverka elektronikprodukter. Energirelaterade produkter regleras av Eco design direktivet (direktiv 2009/125 / EG) som idag innehåller implementeringsåtgärder för energieffektivitet i energirelaterade produkter. I framtiden kommer det även finnas implementeringsåtgärder för materialeffektivisering men idag saknas standardiserade metoder för bedömning av material effektivitet. År 2015 tillförordnades CEN/CENELEC uppdraget att ta fram och utveckla standarder för bedömning av materialeffektivitetsaspekterna; livslängd, återanvändning, reparerbarhet, uppgraderingsbarhet, återtillverkning, återvinningsbarhet och användningen av återvunnet material och innehåll av kritiska råmaterial. Den här studien syftar till att analysera användbarheten hos de preliminära publikationerna av standarderna inom ramen för Ericssons verksamhet. Studien är uppdelad i två delar, del ett bedömer det allmänna och produktspecifika genomförbarheten av de utvalda standarddokumenten. Resultatet från del ett baseras på en dokumentanalys och sju intervjuer, som används för att triangulera de generella åsikterna om standarderna. I del två testas två av metoderna ur standarddokumenten. Resultatets av testerna visar att den utvalda nätverksprodukten hade en återvinningsbarhet på XX% och en återhämtning på XX%. Studien visar även att nätverksprodukten hade en tid för demontering på XX sekunder när den föreslagna metoden eDiM användes. Resultaten av denna studie tyder på att dessa standardiserade metoder välkomnas av Ericsson men mängden data, framtida syfte och pålitligheten av bedömningsmetoderna skapar oro för framtiden.