Material circularity is rapidly shifting from an experimental practice to a viable, scalable strategy for low-carbon construction. This session explores how salvaged structural steel can deliver meaningful carbon reductions, cost-neutral outcomes, and new pathways for project teams to meet the evolving expectations of owners, rating systems, and the broader industry. Using Georgia Tech’s Thomas A. Fanning Student Athlete Performance Center as a detailed case study, presenters will walk through how the project team including Georgia Tech, DPR Construction, The S/L/A/M Collaborative, Walter P Moore, Steel LLC, and Green Circle Demolition successfully deconstructed and reused structural steel from Bobby Dodd Stadium to support a major new athletics facility. Attendees will learn how early alignment, coordinated salvage planning, and adaptive deconstruction strategies enabled the reuse of structural steel, avoided carbon emissions, sustained operations at an active facility and campus, and maintained a cost-neutral project budget with zero impact to schedule. The session will also highlight current and emerging resources from the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) that help define consistent, technically credible pathways for steel reuse. This includes guidance on deconstruction planning, member assessment, refabrication considerations, and documentation practices, as well as ongoing efforts to establish clearer classification and pre-design frameworks for reclaimed steel. Presenters will discuss how the steel industry - across fabricators, service centers, and deconstruction contractors - is positioning itself to support increased demand for salvaged material, and what project teams can expect as reuse moves from isolated case studies toward more standardized practice. Finally, the session will connect these practices to the new LEED v5 circularity and building reuse credits, demonstrating how teams can leverage salvage strategies to earn additional points, reduce embodied carbon, and align with the next generation of sustainability requirements.
