New Bill Seeks to Protect Frontline Communities From Plastics Pollution

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 21, 2022

, New Bill Seeks to Protect Frontline Communities From Plastics Pollution, TheCircularEconomy.com One of the main dangers of plastics is the harm that their production and incineration can do to the health of the people who live nearby. Plastics plants are one of the main factors polluting the air of Louisiana’s Cancer Alley, for example. Now, a group of U.S. lawmakers are seeking to address this environmental justice issue through the newly introduced Protecting Communities from Plastics Act. “Plastic pollution isn’t just a problem for our oceans and climate — it’s a massive environmental injustice, directly impacting frontline and fenceline communities throughout the plastics lifecycle,” U.S. Representative Jared Huffman (D-CA), who introduced the bill, said in a statement emailed to EcoWatch. “My bill will protect the health of our communities, reduce greenhouse gas emissions fueling the climate crisis, and stop the fossil fuel industry’s petro-dictatorship as it eyes plastics as a safety net. The clock is ticking, and we will keep working on this next Congress — but we are sending a message here and now to put oil and gas companies on notice. Our communities must come first.” Huffman introduced the bill Thursday alongside Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Representative Alan Lowenthal (D-CA), who are the legislative team behind the Break Free from Plastic Pollution Act. The bill would both tighten health and environmental regulations for plastics makers and set national targets for reducing the production of certain single-use plastics and for encouraging reusable materials in food and other packaging. The bill’s sponsors also emphasized the contribution that the production and use of plastics — which are set to double over the next 10 years — make to the climate crisis. “As we transition to clean and renewable energy, fossil-based plastic production threatens to derail our efforts to address the climate crisis,” Booker said in a statement emailed to EcoWatch. “In fenceline communities that are near plastic production plants, residents suffer from the release of harmful pollutants and increased rates of debilitating health conditions such as cancer and heart disease. To address these environmental injustices, I am proud to introduce this legislation that will create nationwide targets for plastic source reduction and put a pause on the permitting of new and expanded plastic facilities while the EPA updates regulations for plastic facilities.”

Read the full article at: www.ecowatch.com

thecirculareconomy

The world is round; the economy should be circular

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 2, 2022

Entropy, life-cycle accounting and the circular economy are terms and concepts indicative of how society looks at the world differently than previous generations. As the global population pushes toward 10 billion by the end of this century, thoughtful approaches to sustainability will become ever more essential to policymakers. Yet a coherent narrative remains elusive.
Industrialized countries continue to operate very far from a circular economy. Instead, they rely heavily on a linear economy, where the make-use-dispose product life cycle dominates. A circular economy, by contrast, encourages product reuse and longevity, not disposability and planned obsolescence. Efforts by communities and policymakers to develop circular economies and maintain the viability of natural ecosystems in the United States and other countries take many forms. Several cities around the U.S., including San Antonio, have made it a priority to implement policies aimed at long-term sustainability. For example, in August 2016, the city of San Antonio adopted its SA Tomorrow Sustainability Plan intended to prepare the city for smart, sustainable growth in light of the prospect of an additional million residents by 2040. The plan is a fuller elaboration of past efforts such as Mission Verde and SA2020. For 14 months, the city of San Antonio engaged a broad range of stakeholders in a variety of venues to solicit input and develop the plan. Focus areas include energy, food systems, green buildings, infrastructure, land use, transportation, natural resources, public health and solid waste resources. Cross-cutting themes include air quality, economic vitality, equity, resilience and water resources. On a global basis, some of the most systematic research dealing with sustainability comes from the Stockholm Resilience Centre, which examines planetary boundaries affected by our waste outputs and attempts to gauge those most at risk. The boundaries include stratospheric ozone depletion, which filters out ultraviolet radiation; loss of biosphere integrity, which is necessary for biodiversity; chemical pollution; climate change; ocean acidification; the freshwater cycle; land system change, when forests, grasslands wetlands, coastal fisheries, savannas and other habitats that recycle are converted to municipal, industrial or agricultural use; the nitrogen-phosphorous cycle, or fertilizer runoff; and atmospheric aerosol loading.
Read the full article at: mahb.stanford.edu

thecirculareconomy

Gartner: What to do to make data centers more sustainable

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 21, 2022

Just a few weeks ago Gartner analysts said that sustainability and issues around it would transcend all of the strategic technology trends for 2023. This week at its IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference Gartner described how corporate data centers might make sustainability a practical reality. “IT leaders must avoid wasting value through the premature replacement of IT infrastructure,” said Philip Dawson, vice president and analyst at Gartner, at the conference. “They can do that by using real-time health analytics to maximize the useful life of data-center assets.” “On-premises data centers and cloud providers are extending infrastructure lifecycles from three to five years and from five to seven years to help maximize OPEX cycles and reduce CAPEX investments tied to refresh,” Dawson stated. Above all, the most-effective way that sustainability can reduce costs is through greater energy efficiency and optimized power consumption. It is paramount that infrastructure and operations (I&O) leaders identify where and how data-center infrastructure can be optimized to consume less power, without hindering necessary business operations, Dawson stated. Organizations need a sustainable-technology framework that increases the energy and material efficiency of IT services, and it must enable enterprise sustainability through traceability, analytics, renewable energy, and AI. The framework should also call for the deployment of IT solutions that help organizations achieve their own sustainability goals, distinguished vice president and analyst at Gartner Frances Karamouzis said earlier at the research firm’s IT Symposium/Xpo 2022. “Targeting areas such as data-center power consumption is low-hanging fruit because it’s easy to measure,” Karamouzis said. “What enterprises need to look at is what to deploy as they get more and more data. Are they looking at buying more storage the same old way or are they looking at optimizing that system by looking at things like DNA storage and looking at the level of redundancy they need and implementing technology with a sustainable mindset.” Environmental sustainability on CEOs’ radar, with 9% of them putting it among their top three business priorities, Gartner stated. Nearly 70% of them who Garnter surveyed plan to invest in new sustainable products and in make existing products more sustainable, the analysts stated.

thecirculareconomy

Circular economy database launched | Innovators magazine

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 5, 2022

A new global database drawing on information from 60 countries has been launched to support the growth of the circular economy. Compiled by the Circular Economy Club (CEC), on the back of its international Mapping Week project the open-source database is designed to accelerate the impact of circularity. “If we aim to move towards a circular economy, we first need to understand what is already being done. It is imperative that circular economy advocates come together and clearly document what each of us knows. This database puts these abstract concepts into a tangible form that helps form a clearer picture,” CEC founder Anna Tarí said in a press release. One message that came from the 2000 plus participants – from more than 100 cities – that took part in the Mapping Week was that there needs to be better communication among stakeholders. Anna added: “Something mentioned in most workshop sessions was that stakeholders are not talking effectively among themselves. We suspect this lack of communication may directly influence why certain industries—such as investment, financial and public sectors—appear to be grossly underrepresented in findings.” A post-mapping week campaign is being planned to build on the lessons learned. Check out the CEC website for updates.
Read the full article at: www.innovatorsmag.com

thecirculareconomy

Circular economy in the limelight in Davos – EURACTIV.com

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 7, 2022

The report states that of the 92.8 billion tonnes of exploited resources in 2015 (which equates to 34.4kg of raw materials per person per day, excluding water), only 8.4 billion tonnes was recycled. This equates to just 9.1% of all resources. The Dutch think-tank Circle Economy made the most of the annual meeting of world leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos to publish its first report on the circular economy, titled the Circularity Gap Report. If 21.5 billion tonnes of raw material are put into long-term stock, notably in construction, the remaining 51.9 billion tonnes are transformed into short-lived products and are assumed to be scattered in the environment. Of the 19.4 billion tonnes of materials turned into waste only 46% is recycled, according to the report, whose main objective is to develop a method and indicative references to measure the world economy’s progress towards a more circular economic model. Pressure on natural resources decreased by 28%. This waste completely goes against the environmental commitments discussed by governments and corporation at the COP21. The extraction of natural resources multiplied by twelve between 1900 and 2015 and should double once again by 2050. But a fully circular economy would decrease pressure on natural resources by 28%, the report calculated. Indeed, 67% of greenhouse gases are emitted by the exploitation of natural resources. A fully circular economy would enable us to cut these emissions by 72%, according to the report. A crucial contribution if you take into account the UN’s last Emissions Gap Report published in October, which served as a reference to the Circularity Gap Report. According to the UN report, even if all participating states of the Paris Agreement were to keep to their commitments, the global temperature would most likely rise by 3-3,2°C before 2100. Therefore the agreement’s goal of keeping the global temperature rising above 2°C would not be reached. On 22 January France’s Environment Minister Nicholas Hulot revealed that France had failed to meet its 2016 carbon emission targets by 3.6%.
Read the full article at: www.euractiv.com

thecirculareconomy

The circular economy and the bioeconomy. Partners in sustainability. New report by EEA –

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 6, 2022

The European Environment Agency (EEA) has published its report on the circular economy and the bioeconomy. The circular economy and the bioeconomy — Partners in sustainability shows that the two policy agendas have similar objectives and areas of intervention, including food waste, biomass and bio-based products, and that they would benefit from stronger links, particularly in product and infrastructure design, and collaboration throughout the value chain. According to the report, the increasing demand for food, feed, biomaterials and bioenergy resources could worsen the over-exploitation of natural resources. By extending the lifetime of products and recycling materials, a circular, bio-economy approach can help retain material value and functionality for longer time as well as avoid unrecycled biowaste. Promising innovations and strategies for circular biomass use include biorefinery, 3D printing with bioplastics, multi-purpose crops, better use of residues and food waste, and biowaste treatment. Consumers can also contribute to bioeconomy’s sustainability, for example, by eating less animal-based protein, preventing food waste and separating biowaste from other waste streams, the report says. The report argues that biobased approaches should be tailored to the specific use context in order to maximise the benefits of biobased and biodegradable products. The technological innovation, covering product and infrastructure design, should be embedded in a wider system innovation that also tackles consumer behaviour, product use and waste management. The circular economy and the bioeconomy — Partners in sustainability is the third EEA report on the circular economy that aims to support the framing, implementation and evaluation of European circular economy policy from an environmental perspective. The two previous reports were: Circular economy in Europe – Developing the knowledge base; and Circular by design – Products in the circular economy.
Read the full article at: ilbioeconomista.com

thecirculareconomy

Can Makers produces sustainability report

ByThe Circular Economy Team December 4, 2022

The attention on packaging’s environmental impact has markedly heightened in recent months, putting increasing pressure on governments, brands and retailers to act. Media coverage has been predominantly focused on the marine impact of single use plastics, including plastic bottles, and as a result this has put pressure on other drinks packaging formats too. It gets overlooked, surprisingly often, that there is already a ready-made solution for many drinks to switch to. It’s called the drinks can. The Can Makers says the drinks can is the perfect example of the circular economy already in action, pointing out that when an aluminium can reaches the end of its useful life, the material is never lost. It’s simply collected and recycled, over and over, with no loss of its inherent properties or quality, there’s no need to add virgin raw materials. Up to 75% of all aluminium ever produced is still in use today. The European Commission’s Circular Economy Package (CEP) sets common targets to increase recycling to prevent valuable resources from being lost in the recycling loop. It has set an overall packaging waste recycling target of 75% by 2030 and an aluminium packaging recycling target of 85% by 2030 to help drive the circular economy. The UK Government outlined new targets in 2017 for aluminium, challenging businesses to achieve 64% by 2020. Aluminium drinks cans already contribute significantly to this overall recycling target. 72% of all drinks cans were recycled in the UK in 2017.
Read the full article at: www.packagingnews.co.uk

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