Exploring the Regulatory Landscape for ELMs in the Built Environment

ELMs introduce novel material capabilities—such as self-repair, growth and environmental responsiveness—which hold transformative potential for the built environment. However, these same characteristics challenge existing regulatory frameworks across the full life cycle of ELMs, from early development to end-of-life. 

We have started to map the regulatory landscape across conventional material lifecycle phases.

Our prelimiary conclusions are that ELMs present novel challenges and opportunities by integrating biological systems into the built environment, blurring the boundaries between living and non-living matter. Their dynamic, adaptive and regenerative properties offer fascinating potentials and alternatives to conventional materials,  but they also complicate existing regulatory frameworks. These are currently ill-equipped to handle entities that are simultaneously organisms, materials and technologies across much of the material life-cycle. ELMs raise compliance concerns across their life phases—from design, cultivation, labelling, marketing, installation and use, through to disposal—particularly regarding biosafety, containment and potential reactivation. These complexities demand a rethinking of classification systems, lifecycle responsibility and adaptive governance tailored to the evolving nature of living materials.