Episode 10 is our first circular economy highlights compilation! Perfect listening to spark your ideas for building a better business in 2020. This would be a GREAT episode to share with someone new to the podcast, or new to the circular economy.
We explore the food circular economy, with Lucy Antal of food campaigning charity Feedback Global. Lucy explains Feedback’s aim to regenerate nature by transforming our food system. Feedback promotes a circular economy approach to food surplus – using it to feed people, animals and the soil. We talk about farm gate waste, overproduction and ‘gleaning’, supermarket labelling and Feedback’s work with community groups and children. We discuss the importance of food citizenship and connecting food, people and our environment.
We chat about some of Lucy’s projects, including a new social enterprise, Alchemic Kitchen, and Regional Food Networks.
Elaine Kerr, Deputy Director of International Synergies Northern Ireland talks about industrial symbiosis and how it ‘oils the wheels’ of the circular economy. Elaine explains what industrial symbiosis is, and how International Synergies provides research and facilitation for ‘resource matching’, helping organisations of all types and sizes.
We discuss the multiple benefits of industrial symbiosis: reducing waste and pollution (and associated costs); creating valuable new by-products, jobs, and social value; together with securing access to future resources by setting up local ‘ecosystems’ for materials.
Creating new, local feedstocks from redundant resources can also bring widespread benefits for the local economy, helping improve economic prosperity and resilience. We talk about changing attitudes and the ways young entrepreneurs and social enterprises are creating value from what we used to think of as ‘waste’.
Katie Whalen of In the Loop AB has developed two circular economy games, including the well-known In the Loop game for schools and businesses and the new Risk and Race circular business model game.
Katie is currently researching business aspects of the circular economy at Lund University. We talk about how to engage people to help them understand the benefits and impacts of circular approaches, and Katie tells us about some of her favourite circular economy businesses.
Adam Fairweather and his partner Rosalie McMillan run Smile Plastics, a circular economy business that reimagines local waste streams to make beautiful materials for the built environment. We talk about Adam’s approach to design, and his ethos that ‘material language’ can communicate messages to people through design, creating socially, emotionally and industrially durable products. We explore some of the wide range of projects Adam has been involved in over the last couple of decades. Adam tells us about his plans for decentralised manufacturing, forming an industrial ecosystem to reimagine waste.
Ecodesign expert Katie Beverley describes herself as a ‘critical friend’ of the circular economy. We dig into Ecodesign principles to find out more, and explore how Ecodesign could add value to circular solutions. Katie explains the benefits of user-centred and systems-thinking approaches. We discuss the business ‘ecosystem’, remanufacturing and the circular economy’s potential for local job creation and social benefits, and Ecodesign expert Katie Beverley describes herself as a ‘critical friend’ of the circular economy. We dig into Ecodesign principles to find out more, and explore how Ecodesign could help overcome the ‘teething problems’ of circular solutions. Katie explains the benefits of user-centred and systems-thinking approaches. We discuss the business ‘ecosystem’, remanufacturing and the circular economy’s potential for local job creation and social benefits, and Katie tell us about a range of projects she’s supported as Senior Research Officer with Ecodesign Centre, PDR, at Cardiff Metropolitan University in Wales.
In Episode 4, Jo Godden talks to Catherine Weetman about some of the circular economy elements at the heart of her non-for-profit activewear brand, RubyMoon. Jo was a pioneer of using recycled ocean plastics, and her profits fund other entrepreneurs – putting the ‘economy’ into the circular economy! We chat about valuing your clothing, making sustainability cool, and how the circular economy is the future of fashion. Find out more on www.circulareconomypodcast.com
Tom Harper talks to Catherine Weetman about some of the circular economy projects he has introduced to Unusual Rigging Limited, including circular asset management. Fuelled by a drive to ‘be the change’, Tom has designed and implemented initiatives including asset management, reuse and refurbishment, new services, and new approaches to product design. These circular initiatives have brought wide-ranging benefits to the company, improving customer engagement, reducing costs and boosting its competitive edge.
Unusual Rigging provides rigging and stage engineering solutions to the entertainment, exhibition and special event sectors across Europe.
In Episode 2, we dig a bit deeper into the way we do business now, the linear economy, and why that’s creating problems for business, society and our living planet. Also, we’ll look at the risks that emerge from those big-picture issues, and how they might affect your organisation. Circular approaches can avoid or mitigate many of these risks, and we’ll be interviewing people in business, social enterprises and other organisations that are using the circular economy to re-think the way we make products and design services. I hope their stories will inspire you to use circular approaches to strengthen your own business.
This first episode is a quick intro to explain what the circular economy is and why it’s important. We’ll explore how it helps create better products and services, and at the same time helps to make a better world.
Maybe you already have some green, or community-focussed elements in your business, and you want to go further: to find ways of being more sustainable and profitable! The circular economy can help you do that, and strengthen your business in lots of ways.
We’ll talk about the aims of circular approaches, then we’ll break it down into my 5 components, helping you think about each part of your business.
Next, we’ll look at the benefits for business, with some examples, so you can think about how it can help your own business.