The End of Rubble
A video gone viral in the summer of 2021 showed the simultaneous demolition of 15 new and never-lived-in skyscrapers in the southern Chinese city of Kunming in just 45 seconds. Certainly, the frenzi...
Lula in Rome: we need new geopolitics that will give space to the Global South
A need for peace, in Ukraine and everywhere, and a need to build a new utopia for the global left. Plus the role of the UN and that of the Pope in a world of unprecedented geopolitical balances, the...
Europe approves new rules for sustainable and circular batteries
Europe will be getting more sustainable and circular batteries. It has taken two and a half years, but the process for the new EU regulation on the design, manufacture, and management of both batter...
Fragility in the Depths
The deep sea is only partially explored for less than 1% of its area, making it practically like another planet on Earth. Thousands of meters underwater, deep canyons, towering mountains and boundle...
Agromining: What if we Farmed Metals?
To pluck three golden apples from the garden of the Hesperides, Hercules had to hold the sky on his shoulders instead of Atlas. The pioneers of agromining, on the other hand, hope to have to go thro...
Hans Bruyninckx: beyond the green city, the future is in integrated cities
Innovation, creativity, cooperation, vision: cities have always been the place where change begins and future is built. The path mapped out by the European Green Deal, then, can only start in t...
Deep Sea Mining, the Abyss Rush
The hunt for critical metals, more than for any other resource in human history, is breaking down limits and reaching previously unthinkable frontiers. So, while some are looking toward space, effor...
Cillian Lohan: the Circular Economy is a Positive Story
The sixth edition of the European Circular Economy Stakeholder Conference opens today, Monday 27th February. We asked Cillian Lohan, Vice-President of the EESC and promoter of the initiative, how fa...
Circularity Gap Report 2023: here’s why global circularity has dropped to 7.2%
“The global economy is now only 7.2 percent circular; and it’s getting worse year on year, driven by rising material extraction and use”. This is how the Circularity Gap Report 2023 opens, wit...
Circular Washing: How to Recognise it to Avoid it
The greenwashing road is paved with good intentions, while that of circular washing – its latest and more treacherous evolution – is full of superficiality and inexperience. Yet, like never befo...
How to Communicate about the Circular Economy
From technical model for connoisseurs to (almost) mainstream idea: in a little over a decade, the narrative of the circular economy has experienced massive evolution. But what are the current tools,...
COP27: UN's 10 recommendations against climate greenwashing
“The COPs are mainly used as an opportunity for leaders and people in power to get attention, using many different kinds of greenwashing.” Despite being almost 20 years old now, Greta Thunberg h...
Let’s re-design the fashion system
According to Ellen MacArthur Foundation estimates, the equivalent of one lorry full of clothes is thrown in a landfill or incinerated every second. The global fashion industry keeps growing, but onl...
Brave New Supermarket
Since its very onset, over a century ago, the supermarket model has had only one purpose: to make us buy as much as possible. But nowadays, a more responsible approach to consumption is gaining trac...
Architects of Ecosystems: Will Fungi Shape Our Sustainable Future?
Using fungi and their extraordinary characteristics to “grow” construction materials and degrade pollutants: this is the vision underpinning many studies that soon may lead to real applications ...
(Un)sustainable fashion: H&M is being sued for greenwashing
Swedish fast fashion giant H&M has come under indictment for greenwashing. The plaintiff was American marketing student Chelsea Commodore, who took the case to federal court in New York last Ju...
This is how algae-produced cement could avoid 2 billion tons of CO2
Growing cement instead of manufacturing it. The idea comes from a team of U.S. researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder, who, inspired by coral reef algae, have come up with the idea of imi...
How to develop a textile recycling industry in Europe: Euratex's plan
The end of 2024: meaning, two and a half years from now. This is the deadline that the states of the European Union have set for organizing and implementing mandatory separate collection of textile ...
From recycled wood, a material that is stronger than steel
Recycling wood waste, including wood chips and sawdust, to turn it into a building material even more durable than steel. Phrased that way, it almost sounds as incredible as the discovery of the phi...
Superworms like styrofoam, and that's great news for plastic recycling
The gastronomic preferences of a beetle larvae open new avenues for the circular economy of plastics. From Australia has come news that the larvae of the Zophobas morio beetle, also known as superwo...