150 livestock family farms have joined a bio-economy plant project in Alcarràs, Catalonia, a region with many livestock farms and fruit plantations. The project aims to manage manure in a more sustainable and circular way.
The quantities of used textiles collected in Europe are increasing, while the proportion of high-quality reusable garments is decreasing. Currently, around 50-75 % of the collected textiles is reused, whereas 10-30 % is recycled.
Towards 2030, however, it is expected that a smaller portion will be suitable for reuse, and that more will be fit for recycling. This is because the requirement of separately collected textiles is expected to divert textiles from mixed waste, which is not fit for reuse, as well as of a general trend of falling quality. The lifecycle impact assessment (LCA) of reuse compared to a new product confirms that the environmental impact of reuse is significantly lower than the production of a new garment.
The University of Cambridge (UK) is running a sector-wide workshop on "Speeding up the Transition to Closed Loop Synthetic Fibre Recycling by 2030". It will help industry experts and policy makers co-create strategic policy solutions on how to speed up the transition away from the use of virgin and non-closed loop sources of synthetics towards a full closed loop textile recycling system across the European Union.
The workshop will be held online from 11:00 to 15:00 (London time) on Tuesday 28 February 2023.
The European Commission is conducting a survey on possible new legislation on the management of plastic pellets, with a view to reducing the amount which ends up in the environment.
This survey is only for companies handling plastic pellets in the European Union, in particular small and micro-companies. It will close on Thursday 23 February.
The European Commission, with Studio Feschi&Soci, Green Soluce, Alda and ACCIO, is organising a capacity-building event on the Environmental Footprint methods on Tuesday 28 February 2023 from 10:00 to 14:00 CET in Barcelona, Spain.
This will be a local event held mainly in Spanish, but it will be organised in hybrid format to enable remote participants to join.
Secondary raw material (SRM) markets are crucial for a circular economy. This is because SRMs enable recyclables to re-enter the production value chain, which reduces dependency on primary resources as a result.
This role is acknowledged in the EU circular economy action plan of 2020. However, if policy is to help establish or further develop such markets, we need to better understand the currently-fragmented SRM markets in the EU.
On Day 2 of the European Circular Economy Stakeholder Annual Conference (28 February), a Networking Village will showcase a selection of good practices, initiatives and circular business models. Twenty online and ten on-site exhibitors will bring their work to an audience of around 500 participants. A unique opportunity to pitch projects and matchmaking opportunities. Interested?
The EU is facing increasingly serious societal, environmental and climate challenges. EuRIC is uniquely placed to bridge circularity and climate neutrality. However, regulations and policies are hindering the sector's ability to tackle these societal challenges in partnership with the EU.
Join EuRIC in Brussels on 30 March for a high-level conference that will unite European policymakers and recycling experts from across the circular economy value chain.
On 31 January, the Commission launched an online public consultation on what the new product priorities under the proposed Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR) should be.
The aim is to make products on the EU market increasingly sustainable, by enabling far-reaching performance and information requirements – known as "ecodesign requirements" – to be set on a wide range of them to improve their circularity, energy performance and other environmental sustainability aspects.
