A Truly Circular Economy? That Means True Prices

When he was 16, Eric Lundgren saw a landfill near his small hometown in northwest Washington, filled with brand-new products. Ever since, he’s been building businesses that try to stand between people and their most wasteful instincts. He started an electronics recycling company at 16. He went to prison trying to restore Windows on refurbished computers. He loaded up a junked BMW with used batteries to win a Guinness record for the longest single-charge electric vehicle drive, to make a point.  Now Lundgren is converting big, still-usable batteries from electric vehicles (EV) into backups for solar grids and other uses. If people aren’t going to use what’s right in front of them, he and his more than 100 employees will just have to do it for them. After our CEO Kyle Wiens toured the BigBattery plant in Chatsworth, Calif., and I talked to Lundgren about battery recovery, we came away with a whole new perspective on what you can do with a “used” EV battery.

The College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE) has confirmed that 80 farmers successfully applied for the first year of Northern Ireland’s Protein Crop Payment Pilot Scheme. The support measure will continue into 2022. According to CAFRE’s head of dairy, pigs, poultry and crops, Don Morrow, a total of 679.92ha have been accepted for the scheme this year. It provides support at a level of £330/ha, bringing the total payments to farmers up to £224,578. The eligible crop breakdown for 2021 is as follows: spring beans- 593.17ha; spring peas – 47.233ha; winter beans – 23.17ha; spring sweet lupins – 15.7ha.