SPARK!

Lecture with platform Industrial Symbiosis

Challenge by Arturo Castillo Castillo (Imperial College London) Circular product design

Problem Replicating consumption patterns of todays products in high-growth emerging economies is not viable in energy, greenhouse gas and environmental disruption terms. To create opportunities for beneficial environmental impacts through industrial symbiosis or urban mining, a number of barriers need to be addressed. Most discarded products are outside the control and responsibility of producers. The current composition of most products could cause toxicity when recycled. Manufacturing processes often also yield by-products that are difficult to recycle. Most local authorities across Europe see waste management as a cost. Most of the few stakeholders that see a resource efficiency opportunity still focus on recovering material at the end of the life of products. Background There are techniques (in the inner circle below) that can be applied at particular stages (along the outer circle) of the material life cycle. This challenge focuses on three of them:

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1) Material Flow Analysis helps to trace where most energy and materials are spent. It exposes opportunities for improvement. 2) Service vs. Product Analysis, which can create various business models, e.g.: o o Use oriented => Ownership of the product is retained by the service provider, who sells the functions of the product, e.g. leasing. Result oriented => Products are replaced by services, e.g. voicemail replacing answering machines.

3) Material Function Analysis, which can develop the right materials to provide the desired product attributes and make them suitable for disassembly, re-use or recycling in same-grade applications (e.g. drinking water bottle to drinking water bottle instead of water bottle to traffic cone). These techniques could help address the problems outlined but they have yet to be adopted widely and in an organised way.

Challenges
GROUP A Discussion (15 min): Choose one of the priority materials: chemicals, metals and cement. (1 min) Choose two techniques from the above (1), (2) and (3) and think how you could use them to provide evidence to convince business leaders to switch paradigm? Consider the constraints they face. (7 min) What actions (potential theses or collaboration projects) would be needed to move away from the end of life paradigm and move closer to the circular design paradigm across society? (7 min) Output: (15 min) 1. List of 3 examples of how you would apply your chosen techniques to your chosen material type so that it can be recovered beneficially. 2. Draw a relational diagram or an infographic with the constraints that your recommendations would address. This should visualise the result of using techniques to help stakeholders switch paradigm showing all possible environmental impacts along the material life-cycle. 3. List 3 ideas for e.g. potential theses or collaboration projects

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GROUP B Discussion (15 min): Choose one of the priority materials: chemicals, metals and cement. (1 min) Choose two techniques from the above (1), (2) and (3).How would you use the two techniques to help policy makers design the right incentives? Remember constraints in changing value systems and behaviours. (7 min) What should be the research priorities for industry and academia based on your chosen material and two chosen techniques? (7 min) Output (15 min) 1. List of 3 examples of how you would apply your chosen techniques to your chosen material type so that it can be recovered beneficially. 2. Draw a relational diagram or an infographic with the constraints that your recommendations would address. This should visualise the result of using techniques to help stakeholders switch paradigm showing all possible environmental impacts along the material life-cycle. 3. Include a short paragraph on a policy recommendation that would address the interests of the stakeholders who would have the largest impact (you can focus on one stakeholder group, e.g. only government or research/academia or NGOs or general public).

Future collaboration One of our main interests is in developing the tools to foster circular design suitable for the entire material life cycle. We envisage developing MSc and PhD projects with an emphasis on techno-economic analysis within industrial ecology; including most techniques in the inner circle.

Contact: Arturo Castillo Castillo, a.castillo@imperial.ac.uk

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