Monitoring the twin transition of industrial ecosystems :Construction : analytical report

Measuring performance and monitoring change within an industrial ecosystem are vital components that enable policymakers and industry stakeholders to track progress over time and obtain valuable feedback on whether the system is moving in the desired direction. This report is a contribution to the ‘European Monitor of Industrial Ecosystems’ (EMI) project, initiated by the European Commission's Directorate General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship, and SMEs, in partnership with the European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA). Its primary objective is to present the current state and the advancements achieved over time in terms of the green and digital transition of the Construction industrial ecosystem. The construction industrial ecosystem is a key industrial ecosystem for Europe. Overall, the value-added of the construction ecosystem was €1 208 bn (9.6% of the EU total) in 2019 with a total of 25.4 million persons employed, the majority of which in the construction sector itself. The ecosystem is largely dominated by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), with 75.5% of workers employed by an SME, of which 36.5% are companies with 0-9 persons. The construction industry is typically considered a traditional and low-tech industry with a high environmental impact both in terms of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), as well as materials and resource needs and waste generation. At the same time, the construction industrial ecosystem is faced with further challenges that require technological and industry response, including among others climate change and GHG emissions and demographic change, as well as recycling and recovery to name a few. The green transition in construction is driven by the need to reduce the environmental impact of the construction industry by both improving energy and material efficiency and recyclability. This is apparent from the use of green technologies such as energy saving technologies, renewable energies, advanced materials, and recycling technologies. Digitalisation, with technologies such as Building Information Modelling (BIM), are an essential element to improve efficiency and circularity in construction and develop a more efficient management of resources and of the built environment, showcasing the interplay of the twin transition. At the same time, digitalisation allows to improve the efficiency of design and planning stages of construction projects in term of human resource required but also project execution. In the area of digital technologies, advanced manufacturing and robotics, artificial intelligence, augmented and virtual reality, big data and cloud computing, blockchain, and internet of things play a key role. In this project, the green and digital transition of industrial ecosystems have been analysed based on a tailored monitoring framework and dataset. The data include a business survey, text mining of company websites, startup data, patent applications, trade and production, investments, online job advertisements and job profiles and environmental impact data. The methodology of the data calculations is included in report on the conceptual and methodological framework.