Indicators for Ex-Post Evaluation of Cultural Heritage Adaptive Reuse Impacts in the Perspective of the Circular Economy

Cultural heritage (CH) is considered a key element of cities and regions’ identity and uniqueness, contributing to people's wellbeing and health, as well as jobs creation, environmental regeneration and place attractiveness. The adaptive reuse of abandoned and underused CH can be a sustainable strategy for heritage conservation, stimulating local development processes. However, heritage conservation needs large investments, while the resources available are scarce, and investment projects are subject to high uncertainties. Therefore, a careful assessment of impacts is needed to orient and direct CH adaptive reuse projects towards sustainability. Recent studies approach the adaptive reuse of abandoned buildings and sites as an effective circular economy strategy, potentially contributing to climate objectives through environmental regeneration and the reduction of natural resources consumption. However, evaluation tools to assess the impacts and orient adaptive reuse interventions in the perspective of circularity are lacking. Through the analysis of 76 literature sources on CH impacts, this article explores how indicators are currently used in CH research and practice as impact assessment tools. More than 3500 indicators were retrieved and classified. Finally, this article proposes a comprehensive evaluation framework to assess the impacts of cultural heritage adaptive reuse in the perspective of the circular economy. The results showed that, while some indicators are available, many circularity aspects are not considered in the current studies on CH impacts.