Pilot Partners:
Swegon (manufacturer)
Vasakronan (real estate owner)
Skanska Sweden (contractor)
Demontera (disassembly)
Lindab (manufacturer)
Technical Building Equipment Category:
HVAC
Pilot Description:
Purchasing and installing reused HVAC products instead of newly manufactured ones significantly reduces the climate impact of these systems. However, their availability is currently very limited, and in order to scale up the use of such circular materials, availability must increase. A few HVAC manufacturers have established a system for taking back previously installed products, where these are upgraded in various ways to be resold in a reused/remanufactured format, in some cases with the same warranties as new products. One major obstacle for this model is currently the availability of previously installed products, where many are still being scrapped instead of sent back.
While there are clear incentives to purchase and install reused products, the incentives to send back products to the manufacturer are significantly fewer. It also entails additional costs and the need for new skills, especially in connection with inventory and disassembly, that the disassembly projects have a hard time bearing. As these circular business models are fully dependent on the availability of previously installed products, the obstacles and incentives for this crucial step in the reuse process must be better understood.
The pilot aims to evaluate the process and costs associated with dismantling HVAC products. Dismantling will be done by Demontera, and the HVAC systems will be sent back to the manufacturer, Swegon and Lindab, for reuse/remanufacturing. The same process could be valid for other models as well. The same procedure will be carried out in two projects, one from Vasakronan and one from Skanska, with the aim of evaluating repeatability.