A conceptual framework to investigate the adoption of on-site waste management innovation in Australian building projects

Building waste accounts for over half of the solid waste generated worldwide and has an environmental impact on all stages of the building process, including raw material extraction, manufacturing, transportation, construction and disposal. The recycling and re-use of Construction and Demolition (C&D) waste in Australia is currently below optimal levels and the industry faces ongoing barriers to improvement. Ideally, the industry needs to put greater attention on innovative on-site waste capture and segregation practices, including on-site processing technologies that offer significant benefits, particularly in reducing transport requirements and associated environmental impacts. In order to establish a starting point for empirical research into this topic area, this paper outlines the results of an early review of the literature about on-site waste management innovation and proposes a conceptual framework to be used to investigate the behavioral intentions influencing relevant innovation decisions in building construction projects. To interpret the behavioral dynamics of project-based organizations within the C&D waste management innovation system, a novel conceptual framework is proposed that integrates two key behavioral decision-making theories; Innovation Diffusion Theory (IDT) and Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB). The proposed conceptual framework provides a sound basis for a large scale empirical study of on-site waste management innovation adoption on Australian building projects.