Welcome to Green Tech Valley, focussing on Climate and Circular Solutions. The Green Tech Valley is located in the south of Austria and is internationally regarded as the hotspot for innovative energy and environmental technology.

The Green Tech Cluster initiates growth through innovation. It brings together around 220 companies and research institutions shaping green solutions of the future. With 20 global technology leaders within an hour’s drive, the location forms one of the highest concentrations of companies in this industry.

Have a look at their Don't waste / Invest campaign: One-stop-shop recycling solutions for a wide range of waste fractions derived from Austrian excellence in achieving one of Europe's highest recycling rates.

ReziProK is a funding programme focusing on a resource-efficient circular economy and innovative product cycles, and is run by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). It supports research and development projects which will help reach these goals. The projects seek to close product cycles by developing appropriate business models, design concepts and digital technologies and thus contribute to the implementation of a resource-efficient circular economy.

The projects focus on:

• Promoting the use of recycled materials
• Extending or stepping up product use
• Improving the recyclability of electric vehicles
• Optimising and expanding remanufacturing
• General developments on the topic of blockchain.

The Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra is a future fund collaborating with partners to research, trial and implement bold ideas that shape the future. It aims to make Finland a pioneer in sustainable well-being.

Since 2015, Sitra has been working to lead the way to a circular economy – a new kind of society in which everyday lives and well-being are no longer based on excessive consumption and fossil fuel use.

Currently, Sitra’s work focuses on supporting a fair transition to a circular economy and investigating how business can be based on sharing instead of ownership. Sitra is also working to advance circular trade policies, to increase the understanding of environmental effects of digitisation and to explore the potential of the circular economy to safeguard biodiversity.

The European Sustainable Business Federation Ecopreneur.eu features six national associations with 3000 sustainable companies - mostly SMEs.

A member of the ECESP Coordination Group, Ecopreneur.eu is the international business organisation in Brussels committed to ambitious measures, rules and regulations for a low-carbon circular economy. Ecopreneur.eu advocates a new economic framework by bringing concrete experience from pioneering companies into the political debate, showing best practice examples and advocating the needs of green SMEs in a credible way.

The Ecopreneur.eu Low-Carbon Circular Economy Advocacy Group is a sounding board of circular economy pioneers, including Tarkett, Werner & Mertz, Interface, REMONDIS and HUMANA Kleidersammlung.

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation develops and promotes the idea of a circular economy. It works with, and inspires, business, academia, policymakers, and institutions to mobilise systems solutions at scale, globally.

Its vision is a new economic system that delivers better outcomes for people and the environment. Business models, products, and materials are designed to increase use and reuse, replicating the balance of the natural world, where nothing becomes waste and everything has value.

A circular economy, increasingly built on renewable energy and materials, is distributed, diverse, and inclusive. The Foundation’s work focuses on six interlinking areas:

1. Learning
2. Business
3. Institutions, Governments and Cities
4. Insight and Analysis
5. Systemic Initiatives
6. Communications.

ACR+ is an international network of cities and regions sharing the aim of promoting a sustainable resource management and accelerating the transition towards a circular economy on their territories and beyond. The network currently counts around 100 members, mainly local and regional authorities as well as national networks of local authorities.

As circular economy calls for cooperation between all actors, ACR+ is open to other players in the field of material resource management (NGOs, academic institutions, consultancy or private organisations). For 25 years now, ACR+ has been facilitating the exchange of experiences between members, while also sharing technical and policy information and participating in EU-funded and international projects.