Semantic 3D City Models as a Catalyst for Circular Construction Practices

Rapid global urbanization and escalating environmental challenges demand innovative strategies to reduce waste and enhance resource efficiency. As a major resource consumer, the construction industry requires a transformative shift toward sustainable practices through improved material stock assessments and efficient management of construction and demolition waste (CDW). Semantic 3D city models, utilizing the CityGML standard, provide a structured framework for capturing and analyzing building-related data across various levels of detail (LOD). This paper demonstrates how semantic 3D models could empower stakeholders to perform rapid stock inventories, assess reuse potential, and plan waste-minimizing demolition or renovation scenarios, through a sample system architecture for a Web GIS application built on open-access LOD2 CityGML data enriched with material-specific, recyclability, and life-cycle metadata. This framework underscores the role of semantic information in bridging geometric data and circular-economy decision support, supporting more resilient and resource-efficient urban development.