At a time when there is an increasing focus on the concept of environmental sustainability, it is becoming also increasingly common to hear people talk about circular economy. This expression refers to an economic model capable of self-generation and which stands in stark contrast to the currently prevailing economic model, the so-called linear economy, in which goods have a life cycle that follows this pattern: production, consumption, waste disposal.
The circular economy introduces another step: recycling. In essence, the goal is to minimise the waste of goods that have reached the end of their life cycle as much as possible by adopting an approach aimed at regeneration and reuse. We could summarise this approach with the expression ‘end-of-life valorisation’.
However, the concept of circular economy is not new; it was introduced at a theoretical level in the mid-1960s, although the first concrete examples of its application date back to the 2000s.
Circular economy: the macro-areas of intervention
We could schematise the circular economy by dividing it into four macro-areas of intervention: production and consumption, waste management, secondary raw materials and technological innovation.
Production and consumption are the first key steps in the circular economy; the focus of business and private individuals must be on minimal waste production as a consequence of minimal consumption. Crucial in this respect is the maximum use of renewable materials and energies or, when this is not possible, resources from re-use and recycling. In other words, the input must be sustainable. The end consumer will increasingly have to choose sustainable products, reduce waste and actively participate in product recycling and reuse policies. Also important is the introduction of product quality controls that identify defects in production, as matter of fact this prolongs their life and prevents their premature disposal.
Another fundamental pillar in circular economy, as aforementioned, is waste management. After all, the concept of ‘waste’ changes drastically in the transition from circular to linear economy: in fact, what in the linear economy is waste, in the circular economy becomes a new resource to be exploited. Proper waste management is based on practices such as selective collection, recycling and composting. This, moreover, drastically reduces the need for landfills and incinerators and consequently lowers the impact on the environment.
Secondary raw materials are those resources that are derived from the processing of waste. They can be reintroduced into the production cycle, among other things by reducing the use of other resources. Classic examples of this are the reuse of plastic and glass, which reduces the energy required to produce new products as well as harmful emissions. The proper reuse of products can also be implemented by private individuals who should always ask themselves whether a good can be reused in some way before being thrown away.
The other macro-area of intervention of the circular economy is technological innovation: this takes the form of companies increasingly resorting to production paths whose environmental impact is minimised and where waste is reduced to a minimum. In this transition, technological innovation plays a key role.