The European Race on GPP
To date, Italy is still Europe’s only country where Green Public Procurement (GPP) is compulsory: the boot-shaped country is a GPP textbook case. For over two years, all public procurements h...
Boosting Waste Diversion with Blockchain
Uttering the word “blockchain” within the technology sector will not cause fellow employees to bat an eye, instead they will probably start to delve into a deep discussion on this buzzin...
A Database for the Circular Economy
As the founder of the Circular Economy Club (CEC), it’s safe to say that Anna Tarí is as well placed as anyone to keep her finger on the pulse of what’s happening in the circular ...
CircE: an Interreg Europe Project Steering the Economy Towards a Circular Model
The Circular Economy (CE) is on the tip of the tongue of politicians and business representatives across the European continent and beyond. However, quite often the real issue hindering the developm...
The Construction Industry: Increasingly Green, Increasingly Circular
With estimated overall costs of about $135 billion for the insurance industry, 2017 represented the bleakest year in their history, mainly because of the compensation for damages caused by Hurricane...
Grid-Interactive Buildings: Good for Business and the Environment
Grid-interactive buildings are designed to create lower, flatter, flexible load shapes which reduce operating costs for the building owner. They can also provide services to the grid such as demand ...
Power to Imagination. The Radical Green Future of Ecotopia 2121
Radical, visionary, eccentric, ironic, and firmly outside the box. Shamelessly, boldly and irreverently utopian. You can love it or hate it, but you can surely not remain indifferent to Al...
REbuild: To Decarbonise Construction We Need to Close the Loop
We need a paradigm shift, even in the construction sector. Deep, fast and pervasive. In one word, ground-breaking: or better “disruptive,” as the innovator’s jargon calls it. Innov...
Energiesprong: How to Transform 11,000 Apartments into Net Zero Energy Buildings
Sprong in Dutch means “leap forward.” In fact, a leap forward is exactly what Energiesprong has realised over the last few years in the residential housing construction and energy effici...
The Renewal Workshop - Unsold Clothing on Sale
Name: The Renewal Workshop Sector: Refurbishment and sale of clothing items Plus: Sale of renewed clothing obtained from items deemed unsaleable Characteristics: The Renewal...
RePack, the Packaging with Many Lives
Name: RePack Sector: Reusable packaging service Plus: Reusable and traceable Packaging through the take-back system allowing reuse for at least 20 deliveries Characteristics:&nbs...
Depolymerising Plastic with Gr3n
Name: Gr3n Sector: Technology for PET recycling Plus: Patented technology that uses microwave reactors in order to recycle PET, returning it to its original monomers Characterist...
Hello Tractor, Apps Enter the World of Agriculture
Name: Hello Tractor Sector: Sharing Economy Plus: An App that maps machinery present on a local level and optimises their use and sharing between farmers Characteristics:&n...
European Parliament: Firmer Actions on the Circular Economy
In the first resolution, the European Parliament demanded all “worrying” chemicals contained in waste – according to Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006 (REACH) – be traced and that...
Recommendations After the Collapse of a Bridge
In light of this, people should react differently to a tragedy such as that of Genoa’s Morandi Bridge and should be more careful when making statements. It is certainly not appropriate to expr...
Marx Reloaded
For over a century, social activists and trade-unions have battled for new rights, including those of women, and have fought for changes such as the universalisation of paid holidays and minimum wag...
Chile's Journey
Over the last few years, the circular economy has gained momentum in Latin America. Historically, Chile has based its economy on an agro-mining export model focused on the extraction and exploitatio...
New Model, Different Jobs
Cillian Lohan is Rapporteur of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) for the circular economy. His fundamental conviction that sustainable and resource efficient business models will eve...
The Sustainable Future of Labour
Complexity is key to analysing employment’s social, economic and environmental challenges. This is a pivotal statement in the research and studies by Enrico Giovannini – an eco...
Moving from Endless Growth to Endless Jobs
In his famous book The Ecology of Commerce, Paul Hawken wrote: “[...] we have to look at how our present economic system consistently rewards short-term exploitation while penalising long-term...