Completed notes of the course

Pagina 1

1 The genesis of circular economy The concept of circular economy: When talking about circular econo my we refer to the use of already existing resources (which have already been used for the production of another type of good) in order to make another (similar or different) product; as a matter of fact, circular economy deals with the waste of today, which can become the resource of tomorrow, consequently, forming a cyclical model which uses waste as resource. Important aspects of circular economy: - It deals with the re-design of products, business models and eco-systems which are around resources - It is a model in which interconnection is key - It is a cyclical model and not a linear one: A product (which is a bundle of resources) pursuing a circular economy model is not following a linear one, for which resources end with the end of the lifecycle of the product itself. LINEAR MODEL: BUY → USE → THROW AWAY On the other hand, a cyclical model deals with the idea of disassembling the product/service in order to use the resources around it for other purposes, e.g. the three lenses of the camera of an iPhone 11 are composed of one camera ideally built for the phone and the two others taken by the old phones. CYCLICAL MODEL: It is the idea of designing new products (which are even better) but making use of existing resources. In other words, i f we find a way to redesign the product around resources – considering that not all resources have to be thrown away – we can make a cyclical model. Difference between linear and cyclical model through a graph: Blue: Linear economy Green: Circular economy, that is, the use of the same resource for different inputs → Creation of outputs with less input. 2 - In circular economy the ownership is crucial: In order to explain this, we…