A Reusable Component Data Model for Documenting Building Components in Circular Construction Platforms

Abstract The reuse of building components requires structured information describing their characteristics, condition, and potential for subsequent use. This is particularly challenging in existing buildings, where complete lifecycle information cannot generally be assumed. This study proposes a structured method for deriving a reusable component data model under incomplete data conditions. Candidate information requirements are assessed through explicit Availability and Eligibility criteria and corresponding selection rules, and subsequently organised into a common information structure complemented by component-specific requirements. The resulting model was operationalised within the Building Legacy platform through component-specific parameter structures and individual component data sheet templates, together with a semi-automated data acquisition workflow combining BIM-based extraction with complementary information entry. The approach was applied to six reusable component categories from an existing building case study. The resulting model includes 66 common parameters, while parameter coverage for the analysed components ranged from approximately 53% to 63%. BIM-based acquisition enabled a subset of parameter values to be automatically retrieved and transferred from the Revit model, with all extracted values consistent with the corresponding information previously provided for the analysed components. The study contributes a transparent methodological basis for deriving and operationalising reusable-component information structures while explicitly accommodating incomplete information conditions typical of existing-building contexts.