In a growing number of pioneering projects across Europe and Asia, buildings are being taken apart piece by piece. Their components are catalogued, restored, and reborn in new structures. This is circular construction, and it marks the far end of a much longer story: the building lifecycle. Thinking in terms of the full lifecycle means designing not only for how a building is built and used, but also for how its materials, energy, and components can evolve, circulate, and live on beyond the building itself.
This public event convenes leading Chinese and Swiss researchers and practitioners to explore that shift. Their work represents a rare Sino-Swiss exchange, grounded in real-world cases: large-scale material reuse, deep renovation, zero-emission building pilots, and city-level decarbonization pathways. Alongside material circularity, the program highlights the energy transition in buildings and cities—how urban heating and cooling networks can be coupled across districts, and how renewable energy can be integrated into design, including BIPV and microclimate-responsive design. These technical pathways intertwine individual buildings to city-scale energy systems, showing that circular construction and energy performance can be designed as one integrated lifecycle. A building is not a static object but a dynamic flow of materials, energy, value, and decisions. This lifecycle begins long before construction and continues long after demolition.
Program
Moderator: Yiqiu Liu, Lecturer and Project Co-Lead, ETH Zurich and TU Munich
13:30-14:00 – Registration
14:00-14:05 – Opening Remarks
14:05-14:10 – Whose Life Cycle? Whole-Life Thinking at the Scale of the City – Julio Paulos, Associate Research Director, ETH Zurich
14:10-14:15 – China’s Building Energy Efficiency Standard and Zero-Carbon Building Development – Xinyan Yang, Senior Researcher and Deputy Chief Engineer of the Institute of Carbon Neutrality at the China Academy of Building Research (CABR)
14:15-14:20 – Circular Metabolism: Caring for Matter – Yin Li, Chief Representative (China & Asia), ICI (International Climate Innovation)
14:20-14:25 Beyond the Building: From Ambition to Implementation – René Sigg, Senior Advisor / Partner, Intep – Integrated Planning LLC
14:25-14:30 – Implementing whole-life-carbon principles at scale: real estate portfolios, cities, countries – Martin Jakob, Executive Partner, TEP Energy GmbH
14:30-14:35 – From Building to Nation: Aligning Whole Life Carbon Assessment with Climate Targets in Switzerland – Mija Frossard, Applied R&D Researcher, HEIG-VD (HES-SO)
14:35-14:40 – Open Life Cycle Data for Buildings: Why and How – Xiaojin Zhang, Director, Départ de Sentier
14:40-15:20 – Question Game
15:20-16:00 – Panel Discussion
16:00-16:30 – Coffee Break
