The WaysTUP! project wishes to demonstrate the establishment of new value chains for urban bio-waste used in the production of high value purpose products, through a multi-stakeholder approach according to circular economy principles.
The relationship between innovating business model and the circular economy is complex and rapidly evolving. So, how can we turn the focus on the circular economy into a driver for global sustainability?
The report titled "Incremental Circular Economy as a Serious Sustainability Problem" aims to understand the relationship between business model innovation and the circular economy.
It also seeks to guide companies, intrapreneurs in companies, and organisations working towards a circular economy. And, finally, it aims to provide a structure to understand very different approaches and their outcomes.
On average, a European citizen produces half a ton of waste a year. This amounts to 2.5 billion tons yearly for the entire European Union.
The Joint Initiative on Circular Economy (JICE) is a partnership between the EU’s largest national promotional banks and institutions and the European Investment Bank to invest at least €10 billion in the circular economy by 2023.
It provides loans, equity investment, guarantees, innovative financing structures and technical assistance.
The initiative will support projects that prevent and eliminate waste, increase resource efficiency and promote circular business models. Eligible projects can be submitted to the respective JICE partners.
European project BIOnTop obtains promising results in development of new recyclable and compostable packaging. In its first year, BIOnTop has achieved good results in its experimental work on copolymers and compounds with customized biodegradability and multifunctional coating solutions with customized properties.
This report analyses the scope of the plastic industry for the economy, the planet and society, as well as the policies at European and Spanish context to move towards a new plastic economy. Besides, the trade offs for companies are identified as key challenges.
Finally, the report shows the best practices of eleven companies from different sectors.
Parksharing is the B2B marketplace for businesses who want to share assets, materials, facilities, services and personnel locally.
PharmaSwap is a unique sharing marketplace for pharmacists, hospital-based or otherwise. It creates transparency in the supply and demand for expensive medicines.
Stabilplastik is Europe's only manufacturer of zero waste 100 % recycled mix plastic pallets.
Re-think - Circular Economy Forum is an international event that brings together various actors operating at different levels in the Circular Economy fields who present a medium and long term vision on Circular Economy topics. The event will be online for the audience while the speakers and the main stakeholders will attend the event physically
The post-COVID-19 recovery plan should be extensive, as the effects of the pandemic on people and economy have, in many cases, been devastating. The recovery plan must also fully support the green transition to guarantee resilience over the long term.
The circular economy has the potential to raise EU GDP by billions of euros, and create around 700,000 extra jobs by 2030. With this in mind, the economic approach should be an integral part of that recovery. It is one of the messages of a new EUROCITIES policy statement on the EU Circular Economy Action Plan that sets out how cities, as significant engines for economic growth, can drive the circular economy to unlock economic, environmental and social benefits.
Circular Week is an international campaign which will consist series of events and initiatives devoted to the subject of circular economy and sustainable development that will take place throughout Europe. The Circular Week’s goal is to promote the idea of a circular economy, support sustainable business models and establish cooperation between interested stakeholders.
The AZMUD Project proposes innovations which will help reduce the consumption of water, energy, nutrients and pesticides, and promote the use of waste water in greenhouse cultivations.
AIMPLAS, the Plastics Technology Centre, is coordinating a project called C-SERVEES to develop more circular products like washing machines, laser printers and toner cartridges, TV sets and telecom equipment.
The briefing highlights the key findings of the background report "The Decarbonisation Benefits of Sectoral Circular Economy Actions", produced for the European Environment Agency by Ramboll, Ecologic Institute and Fraunhofer ISI.
The key messages are the following:
Refit Wool is an innovative sustainable material inspired by the world of fashion. It includes fibres from industrial yarn and textile processing.
The European Association of Chemical Distributors (Fecc) acknowledges the Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP) and supports the initiative for a more sustainable approach by ensuring that used resources are kept in the EU economy for as long as possible.
However, on behalf of the European chemical distribution sector, particularly the numerous SMEs it represents, Fecc would like to raise the following points:
Circular Economy Forum Austria is a learning and dialog platform, initiating and promoting the exchange and further development of knowledge, ideas and implementations and identifies potential synergies among companies, politics, science, research and design.
The Forum:
The Environmental Protection Agency has launched a challenge called 'Innovating a Circular Economy for soft plastic in Ireland' under Enterprise Ireland’s Small Business Innovation Research programme. The challenge focuses on reducing/eliminating soft plastic waste generated through the provision of school meals in Ireland.
FoodDrinkEurope - an organisation representing Europe's food and drinks industry - has designed a website explaining what the industry is currently doing to enhance a resource-efficient circular economy.
Entitled Ingredients for a Circular Economy, the website specifically looks at the areas of farming, manufacturing, sustainable packaging and consumers, providing numerous examples of how the European food and drinks industry is helping to promote circular economy. The website also sets out policy recommendations for how to unlock further sustainable growth and innovation for a resource-efficient circular economy in the food and drinks industry.
Nordic Innovation launches a series of workshops, free of charge, to develop collaborative pilots across industry ecosystems, that can be scaled to successful transition towards a circular economy, critical for innovation and economic growth around the Nordics.
In line with a circular economy strategy, the company Favini and chocolatiers Domori have developped an industrial symbiosis system to produce the ecological paper Crush Cocoa from cocoa processing waste.
Refit Cotton is an innovative sustainable material, inspired by the world of fashion, which includes fibres from industrial yarn and textile processing for use in paper production.
Hewlett-Packard (HP) endorses the Circular Computing and proposes remanufactured models as alternatives for new models. This action underlines a highly significant endorsement of Circular Computing’s approach to sustainability at the high end of the IT market.
The Alliance for Flame Retardant Free Furniture welcomes the new Circular Economy Action Plan and calls on EU institutions to address the unnecessary use of chemicals preventing circularity and the achievement of climate goals, such as toxic flame retardants in furniture, which endanger people’s and firefighters’ health as they migrate out of products and can lead to increased fire toxicity.
The use of such retardants is a historical, hazardous and ineffective practice which is not proven to reduce the number of fires. It is at odds with circularity objectives and their presence in furniture runs counter to the ambition to introduce and increase circularity.
Ensuring fire safety is a must, but it needs to be done in ways that are not hazardous.
CIS Nordhavn is a new school building for the Copenhagen International School (CIS). It is a low-energy building and the largest building-integrated photovoltaic installation in Europe.
The European Commission is launching an impact assessment for its new initiative: Empowering the consumer for the green transition, and would be keen on some stakeholders' and citizens' feedback until 1 September 2020.
In 2016, the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development (ENEA) set up a Symbiosis Users Network (SUN) to boost industrial symbiosis in Italy. The network promotes circular economy models through industrial symbiosis by focusing on operational issues.
SUN's 2019 conference was devoted to Good practices of industrial symbiosis in Italy and the contribution of regional policies as a strategic lever. The event, co-organised by SUN, Ecomondo and ENEA was held in Rimini (IT) on 7 November 2019 at Ecomondo - a leading event in Europe for new circular economy models.
Click on 2017 and 2019 to see the reports on SUN's two conferences.
Reports on ENEA-promoted conferences on industrial symbiosis are available here.
The webinar session titled "Artificial Intelligence and Circular Economy" is part of a series of online events by Tondo. It will held on 9 July 2020 at 6 p.m. (in English with the support of slides).
