Environmental Assessment of the Introduction of Digital Technologies in the Building Industry: A Literature Study

Digital technologies play a critical role in enhancing the safety operations, quality, and time management of projects. The building industry has been slower than other sectors to implement digital technologies. On the other hand, life cycle thinking, and sustainable awareness have become increasingly significant concepts. This literature-based research investigates the diffusion of digital technologies in the building sector in the context of their relationship with life cycle assessment (LCA) and other environmental assessment methods. The study examines an extensive database of 800 scientific documents. The findings reveal that Building Information Modelling (BIM) and 3D printing are the most diffused technologies used in conjunction with supporting the environmental assessment or evaluating the impact of the technologies in sustainability-related terms. Despite their expectedly large utilization in the building sector, the application and evaluation of some digital technologies are rarely reported. The study reveals that the end-of-life stage of buildings is associated with the smallest amount of evaluation examples in the examined papers. The integration of the life cycle thinking into approaches foreseeing the use of these technologies can provide significant advantages in terms of separation, recycling and disposal roots for the construction and demolition waste.