Material management practices for construction waste reduction

The construction sector plays a key role in shaping and developing the built environment creating wealth and development for the countries. At the same time the sector is producing negative impacts due to the vast quantities of natural resources required and the high amounts of waste produced. Costa Rica is a country in Central America that has a construction sector contributing in 2016 a 4.4% of its GDP. In the country, several studies have been done in order to determine waste quantities but not the composition of the construction residues. Additionally, causes of waste generation have been reported and grouped in the following categories: design, execution, material management, residuals and other activities. This paper presents the results of a research that has been done with the objective to determine the types of hazardous and non-hazardous waste that are produced during the procurement of an edifice as well as the best general practices used by innovative construction companies to reduce the amount of waste produced.