Renewable Matter #12

RENEWABLE MATTER INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE ON THE BIOECONOMY AND THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY 12 | September-October 2016 Bimonthly Publication Edizioni Ambiente

Ellen MacArthur: The Dame who Failed the Linear Economy •• Ecodesign: What Stage Are We at?

•• Kiribati: A Lesson from Lost Islands

Dossier Canada/Bioeconomy: From Maple Trees to Green Chemistry •• EU Package: Winners and Losers of the Circular Future •• Crowdfunding: Whip-Rounds Are Now Online

Biobutandiol, Better from Sugar that from Oil

Euro 12.00 - Download free online magazine at www.renewablematter.eu

•• Mind the Carbon Bubble •• 99% Mission Accomplished •• A Journey Where Matter Is for Good •• From Waste to Green Building

A Plastic Ocean •• What Cannot Be Cured Must Be Endured

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The Bioeconomy Revolution Interviews with the Protagonists

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GRUPPO

CAP Group at Ecomondo 2016 Research, innovation, sustainability, circular economy

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ilion D1 v a P a r e Rimini Fi o ater Exp Global W tand 145 s 4 w o r

From experiments to produce energy from sludge to innovative solutions for the water service, from smart metering to the search for micropollutants: we will present our projects and discuss the environmental challenges that also face the world of water.

Tuesday 8 November 10.30 - 11.00 CAP Group Stand Workshop: Water Safety Plan, a revolution for tap water 14.30 - 17.00 Global Water Expo Room Conference: Drinking water, emerging pollutants and the first safety plan applications 16.00 - 17.00 CAP Group Stand Workshop: Preliminary market consultation tool for enhancing the value of purification sludge

Wednesday 9 November 10.30 - 11.00 CAP Group Stand Workshop: Searching for leaks in small-medium aqueduct networks.

In association with Blue Gold, BM Tecnologie, Pide, More 10.00 - 13.00 Global Water Expo Room Conference: Water management within the circular economy. Resource recovery from the water cycle: market, value chains and new perspectives for the water utilities and chemical industry 13.00 - 14.30 Utilities Piazza Lunch conference: From treatment plant to biorefinery, the CAP Group experience. In association with: Austep, Althesis, Agrosistemi and Severn Trent, CNR, CIB, Veolia, University of Verona

Thursday 10 November 10.30 - 11.00 CAP Group Stand Workshop: Smart Metering - Drive By and Fixed Network Interoperability. and experimentation of systems of Giamification in water cycle In association with Gest and Politecnico of Milano 14.30 - 17.00 Utilities Piazza Conference: Management of rainwater in the urban environment: current situation and future prospects 14.30 - 17.00 CAP Group Stand Workshop: Enerwater - Latest advances and Water Alliance application hypothesis. In association with the University of Verona

Friday 11 November 10.30 - 11.00 CAP Group Stand Workshop: Webgis for networks - Technology for the sharing economy. In association with Abitat Sit, One team, Brianzacque and Uniacque Bergamo 13.30 - 14.30 CAP Group Stand Workshop: The rural network to help control flooding from urbanised areas, in association with Consorzio Est Ticino Villoresi, Muzza Bassa Lodigiana Reclamation Consortium 14.30 - 16.30 Utilities Piazza Congress: Sewage sludge in farming: science, legislation, economy and news.

#watertoinnovate

www.gruppocap.it comunicazione@capholding.gruppocap.it

WE HAVE TAKEN AN ASTONISHING WEIGHT O F F T H E S H O U L D E R S O F T H E F U T U R E.

At Ecopneus, we have recovered 1 million tonnes of end-of-life tyres, the weight of 8 cruise ships, in just 4 years.

And we have transformed them into something more. Thanks to ethical and transparent work, 100 million end-of-life tyres have made many athletes sweat and have fun becoming basketball courts, tennis courts and football fields.

They have reduced noise in offices, transforming themselves into sound-absorbing walls. They have protected thousands of children as shock absorbent rubber on playgrounds. They have covered kilometres of roads with rubberized asphalt and mitigated the vibrations of numerous tramway lines. They have given sustainable energy to companies in Italy and abroad.

But most of all, they have done something priceless: they have made our country a more liveable place for future generations.

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Printed by Geca Industrie Grafiche using mineral oil free vegetable-based inks.

Geca production system does not produce exhaust and all waste of our manufacture is introduced into a process of collection and recycling. www.gecaonline.it/uk

Printed on: Cover Crush Corn 250 gsm, Text Crush Lentil 120 gsm.

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Events

Editorial

Two Tests for Europe

by Antonio Cianciullo

The Paris Agreement ratification and the circular economy package. These are two important tests for Europe. They will be a way to measure both its political capacity but also our capacity to interpret politics.

Both questions can be interpreted in opposite ways, each supported by a certain degree of logic and a large group of advocates.

Let us sum them up.

First theory: doom-mongers. The Paris Agreement is the umpteenth farce by the circus that for over twenty years has gravitated around the UN to produce conferences leading to no practical results. Do you require proof of it? There you go.

Scientists, including those collaborating with The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in other words the UN, have declared in plain English that in order to secure the atmosphere we must drastically and quickly cut greenhouse gas emissions. We need to leave underground two thirds of known fossil fuel reserves and certainly not looking for new ones as we are still doing! Talks about cuts are just greenwashing: the truth is that we keep polluting as if there were no tomorrow.

The main path to follow was that indicated by the Kyoto Protocol: in principle keeping emission ceilings that should not be overshot and punishing with sanctions those who are at fault. As far as the Circular Economy Package is concerned, suffice it to see how the text submitted by the Juncker Commission reduced the Barroso Commission’s targets: such a shame. Both the Paris Agreement and the Circular Economy Package are a farce.

Second theory: the integrated. The Paris Agreement is not only the best that we can get but also an excellent agreement. Thinking that more could be achieved is midsummer madness: global governance on big ecosystems is a form of extremism leading nowhere. Communism’s orphans try to recycle themselves, but the free market is the only force able to lead us out of the economic crisis. We will proceed step by step, bearing in mind economic priorities. As for the Circular Economy Package, implementing the Juncker Commission’s suggestions will be very difficult, let alone others!

At this point of any argument, we often say that the truth lies somewhere in the middle. A statement loved by those running with the hare and hunting with the hounds, but of little relevance in this case.

In both lines of reasoning what really works is hierarchy: the doom-mongers put the environment on top of the economy while the integrated overturn this priority order. And both fronts have a static vision, as if the game were nearly over and the verdict final. But this is not the case.

The environmental argument without economic sustainability will lead to the collapse of society, and the economic argument without environmental sustainability will lead, albeit a little bit more slowly, to the same result. But it is still all to play for!

In this issue, the debate on the circular economy and the interview with Ellen MacArthur show us that an eco-eco (economic and ecological) growth path is possible as long as we are prepared to carry on a campaign both inside and outside parliaments, with the public opinion and news media that have an increasingly crucial role. What has been achieved so far is undoubtedly not enough to secure our big ecosystems, but it reveals a trend that is gathering momentum and dividing the world of fossil fuels, partly allured by reconverting in order to enter the rapidly growing green market.

“It is not a case of causing a little bit less damage every year, we need to rebuild a different model with great economic potential,” told Renewable Matter the founder of the Elle MacArthur Foundation while defining the Circular Economy Package, “the beginning of a great success.” Of course, technology on its own is not enough: a new attitude and new habits are needed, but the circular economy is a model combining these two very elements. In recent months, we have witnessed the creation of the world’s first industrial plant for the production of biobutanediol without a single drop of oil and the growth of the sharing concept in the mobility sector. If how the game will end is still uncertain, we can say that the cards held by the innovation front have dramatically improved.

We just need to play them to the best of our abilities.

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12|September-October 2016 Contents

RENEWABLE MATTER Antonio Cianciullo

INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE ON THE BIOECONOMY AND THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY www.renewablematter.eu ISSN 2385-2240 Reg. Tribunale di Milano n. 351 del 31/10/2014

edited by

Think Tank

Contributors Agnese Agrizzi, Piero Attoma, Diego Barsotti, Jeremy Benstein, Emanuele Bompan, Mario Bonaccorso, Simona Bonafè, Filippo Brandolini, Rudi Bressa, Mark Campanale, Luigi Capuzzi, Giacomo Cassinese, Gianfranco Di Segni, Joanna Dupont-Inglis, Simona Faccioli, Sergio Ferraris, Roberto Giovannini, Marco Gisotti, Daniele Gizzi, Global Affairs Ministry & Natural Resources Canada, Irene Ivoi, Josu Juaristi Abaunz, Gianfranco Locandro, Ellen MacArthur, Glenn Mason, Alessandro Massalin, Achille Monegato, Ivana Pais, Mauro Panzeri, Piernicola Pedicini, Federico Pedrocchi, Matteo Piras, Fabio Simonelli, Nils Torvalds, Silvia Zamboni, Luca Zocca

Design & Art Direction Mauro Panzeri Layout Michela Lazzaroni Translations Erminio Cella, Laura Fano, Franco Lombini, Mario Tadiello

Policy

Managing Editor Maria Pia Terrosi

Editing Paola Cristina Fraschini, Diego Tavazzi

12

The Dame Who Sank the Linear Economy Interview with Ellen MacArthur

Mauro Panzeri

18

Kiribati’s Lesson

Antonio Cianciullo

22

“On Climate We Need Environmental Justice”

Irene Ivoi

24

The Non-Matter Design

edited by

28

Winners and Losers of a Circular Future

Simona Faccioli

32

Looking After Green Spaces with GPP

Silvia Zamboni

36

If It Becomes an Online Whip-Round

Joanna Dupont-Inglis

Acknowledgments Ilaria Catastini, Alessandro Colantoni, Eliana Farotto, Margherita Gagliardi, Patrizia Giuliotti, Stefania Maggi, Emma Mariconda, Federica Mastroianni, Paolo Palleschi, Mario Pinoli, Luigi Radice

Editorial Coordinator Paola Cristina Fraschini

Two Tests for Europe

Emanuele Bompan

Editor-in-chief Antonio Cianciullo Editorial Director Marco Moro

9

Dossier Canada edited by

41

From Maple Trees to Biorefineries

Mario Bonaccorso Dossier Canada edited by Global Affairs Ministry Canada & Natural Resources Canada

46

edited by Global Affairs Ministry Canada & Natural Resources Canada

49

An Industrial Rebirth

Dossier Canada All Canada’s Resources

11

Executive Coordinator Anna Re

Emanuele Bompan

edited by

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58

Case Studies

Diego Tavazzi

Sugar is Better than Oil

The Unburnable Carbon Bubble Interview with Mark Campanale

Rudi Bressa

61

From Waste to Green Building

Marco Moro

66

Oil Draws a Perfect Circle

Sergio Ferraris

Emanuele Bompan

70

74

A Journey Where Matter is for Good

Artificial and Safe

External Relations Manager (International) Federico Manca External Relations Managers (Italy) Federico Manca, Anna Re, Matteo Reale Press and Media Relations press@renewablematter.eu Contact redazione@materiarinnovabile.it Edizioni Ambiente Via Natale Battaglia 10 20127 Milano, Italia t. +39 02 45487277 f. +39 02 45487333 Advertising marketing@materiarinnovabile.it Annual subscription, 6 paper issues Subscribe on-line at www.materiarinnovabile.it/moduloabbonamento This magazine is composed in Dejavu Pro by Ko Sliggers Published and printed in Italy at GECA S.r.l., San Giuliano Milanese (Mi) Copyright ©Edizioni Ambiente 2016 All rights reserved

Sergio Ferraris

78

Intersecting Supply Chains

Marco Gisotti

82

Mission 99% Accomplished

Sergio Ferraris

86

More Recycling on the Web

Columns

The Media Circle Roberto Giovannini

90

A Plastic Ocean

Innovation Pills Federico Pedrocchi

91

What Can’t Be Cured Must Be Endured

Cover Jan Brueghel the Elder and Peter Paul Rubens, The Earthly Paradise with the Fall of Adam and Eve (detail), oil on canvas, c 1615 Mauritshuis Art Museum, The Hague, Netherlands Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Ellen MacArthur

Think Tank

The Dame Who Sank

the Linear Economy

Interview

How and why an experienced yachtswoman has become the icon of the circular economy. The story of Ellen MacArthur and her foundation, a true global force to help the old economy’s transition. edited by Emanuele Bompan

Ellen MacArthur is the yachtswoman who set a world record for the fastest solo nonstop voyage around the world on her first attempt.

She become the icon of the circular economy when she launched the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, which promoted efforts aimed at reinventing modes of production and consumption.

Energetic, discrete, influential, outspoken, complex, Ellen MacArthur is the Dame of the circular economy. She convinced Google and the World Economic Forum that the linear model is over and that the way we produce and consume across the world can actually be changed.

Ellen McArthur was born 40 years ago in England. At the time, she didn’t know that her fate would be influenced by the most perfect geometrical shape: the circle. In the small Derbyshire village of Whatstandwell, far from the sea, she saved every penny to buy a boat. Her goal? Circle the globe, crossing the oceans as a yachtswoman. And that’s exactly what she did and better than anyone else.

On 7 February 2005 she broke the world record for the fastest solo circumnavigation of the globe, a feat which gained her international fame. It took 71 days, 14 hours, 18 minutes, 33 seconds to sail for for the 27,354 nautical miles (50,660 km).

In 2010, she decided to focus on another circle.

She retired from her sailing career on September 2nd. She had something unique in mind: creating a foundation (today globally-known as the Ellen MacArthur Foundation) to work with business and education to accelerate the transition to a new type of economy. Designing a new model, where everything is regenerative and restorative at the very core. A system where

no output is wasted, no material is worthless, where products enter a circle of reincarnation and transformation, using sustainable energy sources and impacting positively the economy.

An economy shaped like a circle, a circular economy.

Ellen and her foundation worked together to give this new model prominence, involving the World Economic Forum, big corporations like Google, Ikea and Banca Intesa.

She partnered with consulting firms such as McKinsey and inspired thinkers and researchers.

Waves never stopped her. Once you tame the oceans, nothing can stop you. So, she decided to do something even braver, to sail the Earth-ship out of the traditional, linear, petro-capitalist, economic model. And she might set a record too.

Renewable Matter reached her in the Foundation’s HQ in Cowes – Isle of Wight – to discuss the exciting future of the circular economy and her endeavor to achieve something no-one has ever been able to do and to understand how sailing solo can change the world.

Dame MacArthur, 6 years ago you started the EllenMcArthur Foundation, one of the most successful initiatives to establish a new industrial model, inspired by thinkers as Amory Lovins, Gunter Pauli and William McDonough.

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All images taken from www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org

renewablematter 12. 2016

Emanuele Bompan, an urban geographer and environmental journalist since 2008.

Together with Ilaria Brambilla he authored the book Che cos’è l’economia circolare (“What’s the circular economy”) Edizioni Ambiente, 2016.

Ellen MacArthur publications, www.ellenmacarthur foundation.org/ publications

How has this journey been and what is the aim of the Foundation?

“The aim is to extend the idea of a circular economy to the global economy. Our first step to success was to work on the circular economy and define it, trying to understand the circular economy as best as we could. It’s continuously evolving and we still only understand a very small percentage of what it really is.

“But to understand the circular economy’s systemic nature and systemic mutation, we have to take into account raw materials, biological cycles, technology, the service industry and banking, it encompasses everything.

Furthermore, it is fundamental to understand that a grasp of the circular economy is systemic.

Once defined what the circular economy was we needed to take the idea out there.

“So, over the years, we have introduced eight reports and three books on the circular economy. The first report, launched at the World Economic Forum in 2012, was looking at medium-complex circularity to more than one year and to less than ten. The top line figure was US$ 600 billion dollars worth of economic opportunity in 2005. The numbers were big, even if they were only looking at recycling 25% of products’ components per year. But the report was an epiphany and an eye opener, people really began to realize that it was indeed a real opportunity.

“We then went on a second report, which was January 2013, looking the FMCG (Fast-Moving Consumer Goods). We discovered an economic potential of US$700 billion in the global market, not much harder not to achieve because the FMCG is much faster. We looked at the biological elements of food waste and plastic packaging as material with high potential. With the second report, we were invited to the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos. By year three, we had a partnership with the WEF. The third report, which was looking at how the global and economic

value supply chains can become circular, was co-branded with the WEF. We had an impact on the global economy.”

And how did you evolve from there?

Revolutionizing the global economy, I must say, is no small task.

“When we launched the Foundation we set out to work in three key areas.

“First: working directly with businesses, looking at how they could become more circular.

At the beginning we knew very little about that journey, we just had a vague idea of what success looked like.

“Another area we wanted to work on was analysis insight: understanding the economic rationality.

“The third area was looking at the opportunity through education for the circular economy.

I stress this aspect in particular, as we do executive education.

“It is beyond just publishing economic papers: we show the value of the education of the circular economy. We do this education project to create real circular business leaders but also to provide an inspirational perspective, so that people can see there is a different way in which our economy can function, especially for young people, who are still in the phase of life where ideas are being imprinted.

We receive fantastic feedback from them because suddenly there’s so much to be done, the more we do, the faster, the better we can get to a restorative, regenerative, powerful economy. We hope that in the future there will be a circular generation.”

What direction will your work take in the future?

“In the future, I see the Foundation continuing to work on education, with businesses, cities and governments, on communication and publications, accelerating ideas, and promoting

Think Tank systemic initiatives. Our view is that we will continue to focus on those five areas and push, as hard as we can, as we always have, as a team.

Now we work in many areas: we have people in Brazil, the States, here in the UK, across Europe. We have a team in Brussels, India and China, looking at economic studies and building initiatives. Our work is expanding very quickly, it’s becoming global at a breathtaking speed I could not even imagine only three years ago.

Just bringing those five things to a global level, in the way that we know it worked at the World Economic Forum, will entail a great deal of work ahead of us. It’s so complex that it’s impossible to say where we will be in ten years’ time.”

Yours is the most sophisticated and global observatory on the topic. Where is the circular economy establishing solid roots?

“I would say it’s definitely more advanced in Europe. There are elements that occur in many countries, but an understanding of the systemic nature of this change, I would say it is more of a European phenomenon. Overseas, the market is beginning to kick off: we have a team in the US and we have incredibly positive conversations, we have global partners in the US. Emerging markets have also a huge potential in the circular economy. In the Western World, we have built the linear system, we have a linear production, a linear thinking, a linear design, it’s hard to get out of it. In emerging markets, you can escape the linear system. It would make much more sense to start from scratch and embrace the circular economy straight away.”

How are you pushing circular economy’s ideas in developing economies? Has the Foundation tried to lobby cooperation and development agencies, to have them bridging these models?

“We had many conversations with organizations such as the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and of course the World Economic Forum; we organized informal gatherings with the world’s economic leaders. We are targeting specifically Africa and the potential for its development, there are many conversations going on about circular economic benefits and there is a massive opportunity there.

Once you realize how great an opportunity is, suddenly you are building an economic model which is restorative, which manages to keep products and materials with the highest recorded value. It’s not just containing the damage on a yearly basis, it’s like rebuilding a different model with massive economic potential. It’s going to be challenging, there are many barriers along the way.”

The EU has just approved a Circular Economy Package, with a set of policies allocating incentives to the industry in order to develop circular economy business

models. Do you think we need more ambitious policies than these?

“It’s part of a process. We still know so little about the circular economy. As with policies, trying to do the right thing is actually incredibly challenging because the last thing you want to do is to put something in place, with the right intentions only to find out it generates the opposite effect. The circular economy is policy-relevant not policy-prescriptive.

So policies can help, but they don’t necessarily have to define exactly what needs to be done.

It will be trial and error, I’m sure, but what has been incredibly positive about the process with the European Commission is that it has shifted from being focused on simply waste to a real circular economy package, with systemic change and the launch of a public consultation last summer, which made a difference.

“I think the Package has been a very successful start. Look at the feedback from businesses, cities, regions that have worked on this for many years, going back to the Commission after the first package, saying we need the circular economy to happen, not just waste management.

I think we have a real opportunity to create an innovative legislation: both parties want to create the circular economy.”

Which EU country is the leader in the field?

“There’s a lot of work happening in Holland, for sure. Over the past 10 years they have been working with the government and the general public. In the Netherlands they have a slightly different and open attitude. Some of the challenges they had with the geography and the limited territory are indeed the reason why the circular thinking has gained momentum.

There are some astonishing examples of industrial processes. But there are pockets in unlikely places. We worked for example with the city of Phoenix, or with Barcelona, places really forward-thinking.”

Ellen MacArthur Foundation, www.ellenmacarthur foundation.org

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renewablematter 12. 2016 How can a city or a region become a circular economy leader?

“You need to involve all the stakeholders. When you are creating a systemic change, it’s not easy because you can’t do it alone, you have to do it with many other partners, you need to bring everybody to the table in order to create that systemic change.”

Many fear that the circular model might impact jobs. What does your research show?

“When we carried out the study on Europe, at the beginning of the public consultation [for the Circular Package], we worked specifically with the German Employment Economic Group, and we were specifically looking at what influence the circular economy would have on employment. Would employment rise or fall?

Results showed that most probably it would have a positive impact. Actually there would be less employment in the raw material industry but there would be more employment in the remanufacturing and service industries. Take Airbnb as an example of the circular economy: you have huge hotels being built all over the world – it is a clear linear model and then suddenly Airbnb pops up, showing there is a lot of unused space in buildings that can be utilized otherwise. And through the IT digital revolution it unlocks spaces which were previously unavailable, almost impossible to find.

Suddenly we have this visibility into spare space within the global economy. It could be spare materials, spare equipment, anything: suddenly everything has the ability to be connected. And this creates jobs. This is the time for the circular economy because we have the information technology that can help this. Five years ago we couldn’t predict what the digital revolution would have done for employment, suddenly the informal economy, the sharing, the circular are showing opportunities.”

How will trade change with the circular economy?

“If you look at small businesses trying to become more circular, providing a product-as-a-service, they might buy the product upfront from larger manufacture company, of course, but then they need a constant relationship with the manufacturer and the customers, as they might offer life extension services, or they might be able to remanufacture those products locally.

Now in the traditional enterprise you buy the product and you sell it and then re-sell it.

End of story. That would change because customers will not own the materials, they will only use it for some time. For the company, that piece of equipment will be ‘in someone else’s house’ for a while. Indeed for the financial sector this will be a huge change.

Financial firms are trying to understand how a business that has adopted a circular model will unlock more economic potential and will set its revenue model. Just having the banking sector understanding whether companies are trying to get to its key, you have this huge big development of where value changes and who owns value.

“Having the finance sector understanding the difference between linear and circular is key.”

The Foundation carries out extensive research. Does it work with specific research centres?

“We have 14 university partnerships, to support teaching and research in the circular economy, from London University to Bocconi University in Milan.

“We are seeing growing interests in the research partnerships. Professors want to get involved, they see the opportunity, they want to understand the circular economy more deeply. We need to fathom the consequences of the adoption of such models, take Uber or Airbnb as an example. We are going to do things differently, we are going to find spare vehicles, we are going to find spare buildings, to remanufacture everything, and we need to find a way to utilize them, to benefit from these processes. We are building a picture of what the circular economy is, and the more we have of that picture, the more straightforward it would be for new companies, cities, regions to step in the circular space.”

How come that a record-breaking yachtswoman has become the icon of the circular economy?

“It was very unexpected; I never thought I would do this. All I wanted to do from the age of 4 was to sail a boat, and I spent all my free time thinking about sailing. For years, I saved my school money for a boat, I left school at 17 to become a sailing instructor, at 18 I set out for my solo round-the-world tour. Everything was about sailing, everything was about being

Think Tank

World Economic Forum, The Race for Resources with Ellen McArthur, At a Glance, Earth Timelapse, Davos, April, 2016, Video Still

Our economy is not that different from a boat, since we have a world with limited resources.

But while at the end of my voyage I go back home, restock and sail off again, we cannot do that, we have no other resources.

at sea, everything was about finding a sponsor, everything was about getting out there and being on the water and I absolutely loved it. I still love it as much today as I ever did, it’s a massive magnet for me being on the sea. There was absolutely no reason to step out of that, I should still be doing it now. But then suddenly the penny dropped. You know, it’s incredibly difficult when you go to sea. Imagine to be about to go off today from Italy to sail around the world, nonstop, you would take everything you need for your survival. Everything. You have a boat, your little world, and you put everything on that, for your survival for the next 3 months, or 4 or 5, depending on how fast your boat is. Now when you leave, that’s it. Your link with the land stop, and you prepare to be at sea for the full duration, if you run out of something, that’s it, you can’t stop and buy more, in the deep ocean you are 2,500 miles from the nearest town, five days away from everything, so you really are isolated and you really do develop a different way of thinking.

You get used to it and you go into a different mode. And suddenly it dawned on me with the second round-the-world tour that our economy is no different than my boat. We have a world with finite resources: it’s absolutely no different from the boat. When I finish my journey, I go back and I restock and I set off again. But we cannot do that, we don’t have more resources, and it just suddenly hit me, and I knew nothing about the circular economy, I never heard the word, never came across the idea, I knew absolutely nothing.

It’s what brought me to try to understand the global economy. I started reading every book I could, I met experts, scientist, economists, educators, tried to understand. If this current model that we use doesn’t work, what does?

And initially you point to ‘we need to use less, we need to travel less’. But then you realize that all of that is essential, we absolutely need to be incredibly careful with what we use now because we have finite resources. It’s not that we are going to educate every young person in the world, ‘we just need to use everything a little bit less.’ You know it doesn’t work, because we have desires. And then you start thinking ‘So what does work?’ And suddenly you see that if we change the system, we can recover all the materials, we use biomimicry design, sharing economy models – which brings the utilization of products to the highest level – and the performance economy where they were able to do the same with bigger products.

Suddenly you see that systemic thinking can change everything. And it was the personal journey I went on that made me realize that the system doesn’t work, the linear economy doesn’t work in the long term. That is how I started to think, alone in my boat, about a new economy, which is able to be restorative and regenerative, to rebuild natural capital, which has basically degraded since the beginning of the industrial revolution.

And now the race is on!”

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Kiribati’s Lesson Natural paradises and remote islands in the Pacific Ocean hide more complex stories than an exotic postcard: for instance, disappearing atolls nearly submerged by water. In their book Kiribati, two travellers tell the story of an archipelago on the other side of the world.

by Mauro Panzeri

Pacific Ocean, about 14,500 km from Italy: Kiribati, formerly known as Gilbert Islands, has been a republic since 1979 and geographically belongs to Micronesia.

717 square kilometres and 100,000 inhabitants, highly populated and plagued by high unemployment, Kiribati comprises 33 coral atolls rising just above sea level.

Its people are mainly fishermen, sailors and farmers, half of whom live in Tarawa, the atoll where its capital is located.

Contrary to what the hit and run paradise maps would lead us to believe, tourism is not the main source of income in Kiribati.

Let us go over its recent history: it was a British protectorate, a type of colonialism characterized by the overexploitation of resources and forced transfer of people to Nauru, 700 kilometres from Tarawa, to work in phosphate mines.

Then in 1942 it was occupied by Japan that

lost it soon afterwards in a terrible battle with the USA and finally in the 1960s more than 30 hydrogen bombs were dropped in the area.

Not the simplest past for a paradise.

Today Kiribati is facing a new and alarming problem. These Pacific islands must tackle the problem brought about by climate change: sea level rise caused by global warming and strong storms have jeopardized their fragile ecosystem and eroded their coastline letting seawater penetrate into the atolls thus contaminating drinking water and destroying crops. This is how Kiribati is slowly disappearing.

Partly already submerged, in 20 years it will be uninhabitable and in 50/100 years it will disappear from maps for good. The name Kiribati has become famous the world over, discussed in major international summits, a vivid example and a powerful argument. This is its burden.

It has become not only a controversial case

All images ©24 ORE Cultura, 2016

Think Tank 19

All images ©24 ORE Cultura, 2016

20 renewablematter 12. 2016

Think Tank

but also one for which finding a solution is very difficult. A few years ago, former President Anote Tong bought 5,000 acres of free land in Vanua Levu on Fiji Islands (3,000 km to the South) with the aim of transferring its population in a gradual but highly costly migration, especially in human terms. Environmental migrants, another well-known topic.

Attracted to these and other faraway stories, two young Italian designers, Alice Piciocchi and Andrea Angeli, decided to quit their jobs to cross the world and go to Kiribati.

“We left Italy with the idea that we would find a nation in a state of emergency, scarred families with suitcases at the ready and a strong evacuation strategy shared at national level. But what we found was a completely different scenario” they write in the preface of their book which is now an account of their journey.

Kiribati. Cronache illustrate da una terra (s)perduta (Kiribati. Illustrated Chronicles from a Lost Land) is a book born after their long and certainly not touristy visit to Kiribati.

In Kiribati the two foreigners, who are few and far between, met families, attended ceremonies, gathered notes, videos, photos, recordings while forging relations and friendships. Their aim was to be welcomed but also to be sensitive in order to listen, understand and document. Only when they

came back did they decide to turn their experience into a book. It was well worth it, because Kiribati does not deserve to be just a textbook environmental case. The authors discovered, for instance, that the inhabitants are not worried about this emergency and have no clear idea of what the future holds.

They lead a life that is both simple and difficult, surrounded by beautiful plants and fish, diet problems, aquifer pollution, obesity due to imported goods, ancient traditions and present impacts and poor communication.

The book was inspired by 19th-century travel memoirs full of illustrations, narrative and legends: Kiribati is a light and gentle ethnographic volume, very contemporary but without a single photo, with elegantly coloured drawings and written as a simple personal diary; illustrated tables tell about people, dreams, architecture, rites, animals and fruits, water and the sky.

Its beautiful infographics make it even more contemporary. Do you want to know Kiribati and its people? This is the book you have been waiting for. Illustrations in this article have been taken from the book.

Alice Piciocchi and Andrea Angeli, Kiribati. Cronache illustrate da una terra (s)perduta, 24 ORE Cultura, 2016

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“On Climate We Need ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE”

by Antonio Cianciullo

Rabbi Gianfranco Di Segni and Jeremy Benstein, professor of environmental ethics and associate director of the Heschel Center for Sustainability in Tel Aviv, explain the Jewish point of view on the challenge of recovering the balance between man and nature.

Think Tank

Heschel Center for Sustainability, www.heschel.org.il/ heschelen-media

Lynn White, “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis”, Science 10 March 1967, v. 155, n. 3767, pp. 1203-1207; oi: 10.1126/ science.155.3767.1203

The etymology of “garden” (gan) in Hebrew is the same as “to preserve” or “to protect” (le-hagen). The passage from Deuteronomy (20:19-20) forbids destroying fruit trees even during war or when sieging a city.

The request (Numbers 35:2-5) of leaving a one-thousand-cubit-wide belt around a city where no houses or farming are allowed in order to improve “the beauty of the city” explains Ovadià da Bertinoro (Bertinoro, 1455 – Jerusalem, 1516). It is the request (Qohelet Rabbà) not to cause irreparable damage: “When the Almighty created Adam, he took him around the garden of Eden. He told him: ‘Look at my works, look how beautiful, how marvelous they are! I made them for you.

Be careful not to strip or destroy my world, because if you do no one will be able to put it right”.”

These are the footprints to explore the road of environmental sustainability in the Jewish world.

All three monotheist religions (as we have seen in the articles published in Renewable Matter issues 4, 6/7 and 10) share the aspiration to take care of creation.

But these guidelines had to put up with a tormented history and interpretations that ended up leading humanity in the opposite direction.

On the tide of the alarm caused by the biblical proportions that climate change risks assuming today, the religious world is shaken by a flurry of environmental worries expressed differently according to the tradition of each community and the organizational models chosen by each religion. With Laudato si’, the Pope has given to this issue an unprecedented strong signal also referring to the need to concretely overcome the problem and revive the use of renewable sources and matter recovery as opposed to the culture of waste. The Muslim world is characterized by contradictory forces as far as modernity as well as its commitment to find a solution to environmental issues are concerned.

What is the sensitivity of Hebraism faced with the very real risks that no ancient text could foresee and that must then be judged interpreting in a modern fashion its teachings?

About one third of Hebraism’s precepts is ascribable to the protection of health and the environment, but how are they applied? Rabbi Gianfranco Di Segni highlights some elements that can provide some keys to interpret them.

For instance, the relationship with food: “In the beginning mankind was vegetarian, in the messianic era it will go back to that and in any case nutrition must be obtained without casing suffering to animals. Moreover Talmud specifies the distances between houses and activities with the most environmental impact as far as pollution and noise are concerned.

These are all signs, together with the great

respect for trees, that show an ancient attention to these issues that nowadays is more topical than ever.”

Ancient attention with reference to detailed aspects, new problems concerning global aspects. How can this gap be bridged?

“It is not easy to answer for two reasons.

First, ‘how to solve the climate problem’ is not the main focus of Hebraism,” Jeremy Bensteins says. “Second, there are sixteen million Jews, many communities and conflicting opinions on topical issues: it is difficult to say what the Jewish world thinks as a whole. For instance, in Philadelphia, there is a group very much committed to environmental issues, but there are also others that think differently. But in a word, we are not doing enough.”

Is there a theoretical reference that can act as focal point for this renewed attention?

“The concept of stewardship, mentioned

by Lynn White in ‘The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis’,” Benstein continues.

“The idea of a leadership obtained by putting ourselves in the service of others. Starting from shared goods to build managing strategies for the common interest. We are not faced with a zero-sum game where what is gained by one person must be lost by someone else.

It is rather a win-win perspective where we can only win together.”

But the place where you live seems to follow the opposite logic: the Arab-Israeli conflict is also fuelled by tensions for the control of environmental resources, starting from water.

“I think there is personal responsibility and we must pursue the goal of environmental justice.

If Palestinians suffer for lack of water there can be no peace and no sustainability in the whole region. And this is an indication that I get from the Bible: we have just celebrate Passover that is freedom from slavery.

Those who fled slavery in Egypt can only oppose any kind of slavery: this is the root of the call for environmental and social justice.”

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The NON-MATTER

Design

Between Immaterial Future and Re-Matter to be In-Formed

by Irene Ivoi

1. As praised by Ernesto Nathan Rogers in 1952.

2. As Robert J. Gordon in The Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living since the Civil Wars, Princeton University Press, 2016, the average life expectancy, which did not increase by much in the Nineteenth century, went up by one year every three between 1890 and 1959; the average extension then halved during the remainder of the century. Life also became healthier thanks mainly to large investments in the sewage systems and domestic running water, to Pasteur’s discoveries and in particular to the use of cars that reduced dramatically, in rural areas, the travelling times of doctors between one patient to the next.

At university we were taught that industrial design was born in England during the Industrial Revolution with the design of new products to be reproduced in a number of copies (one of the most successful examples is Wedgwood china).

It was in the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries that designers had the opportunity to design pretty much anything, inventing themselves in the first place, their cultural and philosophical identities, holding the reins of the forms and functions of domestic and urban landscapes of the last 200 years.

True, not all objects around stemmed from a designing mind: a great deal of anonymous design (just think of the “Hidden Forms” exhibition held in 2014 at Triennale di Milano) has made quite an entrance into our lives, but from “the spoon to the city”1 designers were able to produce many things.

This is precisely what – more than any industrial revolution – transformed human life: big and small innovations available in the USA during the first half of the 20th century generated an astounding increase in wellbeing and quality of life.2 The criticism raised from the Seventies onwards – suffice it to think of giants such as Victor Papanek and Enzo Mari – has been relegated to

an intellectual area, within a debate for a limited number of people. Then, during the 80s, worn out by “everything” that was designed, designers took it upon themselves to redesign everything.

At the time, the supply market did not ask itself too many questions, it only asked for shapes: this was the design’s task. The diktat was to interpret shapes, which had to be seductive and impressive: a sort of vanity fair untouched by the early debates in Italy and Europe on the limits of development. Designers went undisturbed inventing sensual and silky surfaces, mystifying matter, making cool any type of veneer of pattern.

So, our matter universe has become more and more mixed, varied and confused.

The economy was taking its course: it generated deficit and public debt, but it did work and no questions were asked.

The Onset of Doubt The early debates on separate waste collection of materials – dating back to nearly 20 years ago – were also an attempt, rarely fully understood, to simplify an obese, omnivore and therefore complex reality.

Meanwhile, directives on waste were introduced that changed the face of public policies and also private responsibilities in the field of waste

Think Tank 3. The Green Book on the integrated product policy, Com (2001) 68 def, 7.2.01.

4. The term ecodesign or eco-compatible planning means “integration of environmental aspects in the planning of a product in view of improving environmental performance during its whole life cycle” – Directive 2005/32/CE of 6th July 2005 about the setting up of a framework for the elaboration of specifications for ecocompatible planning of products consuming energy and with a modification of directive 92/42/CEE of the Council and directives 96/57/CE and 2000/55/CE of the European Parliament and the Council – Art. 2 def. 23.

Irene Ivoi deals with research, implementation and communication of product policies and strategies for environmental impact prevention for supply chain consortia, public administration and businesses. An industrial design graduate, she believes in the designer role with special attention to (eco) processes and services.

management (that at the time were not yet defined as resources). In particular, the 2001 Green Book on integrated product policies (IPP)3 called upon the importance of the life cycle and therefore the value of ecodesign.

Actually, already in the late Nineties, Europe urged people to reflect on the need to integrate environmental policies to improve products and services within their respective life cycles. The key issue was how to obtain, in the most efficient way, more ecological products: back then, there was a lot of talk about the imminent revolution produced by recycled materials that were supposed to re-enter our lives as re-matter and about how consumers could use them.

In order to hope for a brighter future – with less consequences to manage – that was the game to play. Sadly, designers sensitive to those issues were few and far between because there were few entrepreneurs in that environment willing to hire them; design was still an exotic concept, so in those years green products were ugly, very few, poor and often too leftist.

They had no appeal and were ideological. Nor were they democratic, since they were too expensive and rarely affordable by the masses.

However, in the 90s, designers were entrusted

with a new task: designing new ecological processes and services, not just mere products.

With the end of hedonism of the Reagan years, designers were able to reinvent themselves – in the role and function – in a sustainable way.

Ezio Manzini became the famous prophet that ushered in the passage from products to services. These were the years when the need to express creativity not just in the designing not only of goods started to take shape.

Such creativity was also applied to interactions, reciprocity, new paradigms, itineraries and sustainable functions.

Today the ecodesign4 principles defined for products linked to energy consumption of energy efficiency (Directive 2009/125/CE) look like literature. However, despite their predictability and unable to make news, their application has introduced large benefits for the environment and the wallet. Moreover, best practices, that up to 10-15 years ago were only a few dozens, are more and more ingrained in businesses: a proliferation of training programmes are proof of that, as well as the debates at the European Commission, at national and even at local level.

The green economy, now the circular economy,

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renewablematter 12. 2016 5. Legambiente at the forum on waste of June 2016 made a conservative estimate of 199,000 new jobs created in Italy by the circular economy, after those lost due to the overcoming of the previous production model. The EU Commission talks about 400,000 jobs, with an additional 180,000 thanks to the Circular Economy Package; according to Wrap, a British NGO, there would be 3 million new jobs in the EU; according to the Green Alliance, in Italy, the new jobs will be up to 541,000 instead of 199,000.

These are all interesting numbers, albeit vague.

employs an increasingly higher number of people:5 according to the EU Commission estimates, European jobs in this sector have now reached 400,000.

Circular means the ability to produce and consume goods so as to generate a kind of wealth that does not disperse, that does not generate useless output and that regenerates and uses all (or almost) that it encounters in its way.

An autotrophic economy which takes inspiration for its roots and creativity from the recent crisis.

But, almost simultaneously, the Third Industrial Revolution makes its entrance, i.e. the digital society. The latter is bound to disintermediate with more and more ease production codes and dematerializes knowledge only to recompose it according to other paradigms, designing a challenging future, unthinkable up until the day before yesterday.

So, on the one hand, we have the crisis, making matter recycling advantageous,

by also regenerating the idea of the gift economy and services. On the other, digital innovation, characterized by its bits instead of matter.

In this way, the designers’ role becomes increasingly important because, together and thanks to new entrepreneurs, must shape change... and not just mere products!

Some designers manage it by becoming selfproducers, other by introducing eco-innovations6 (sometimes even digital ones) in traditional businesses, often designing processes of access to goods rather than ownership.7 And others still by intervening at social level redesigning relations and interactions against the backdrop of urban contexts where civil society becomes a protagonist, in search of more contemporary relationships and developments.

Circular Actions What are the distinctive features of the circular economy that underpin designers’ actions?

Accessories for the Leuvenhaven table Project by Sebastiano Tonelli developed in Rotterdam within an Erasmus at Willem de Kooning Academie.

Sebastiano Tonelli graduated in 2015 with “25% Collection” at NABA in Milan where he completed his three-year couse in design and his two-year specialization in Product Design.

Leuvehaven was born out of a cultural dialogue with local craftmanship and its products.

In Holland the lure of embroidery and fishing are still very strong. Leuvehaven is born out the iconic recovery of such tradition and the fishing nets used.

Think Tank 6. One of the most illuminating cases is www.miniwiz.com 7. One amusing example is www.mudjeans.eu/

When it comes to self-production, the ability to use local resources that don’t travel many miles (and therefore they do not pollute much) and become and expression of territoriality, one of the key elements of the circular economy. If such resources are production waste, i.e. of processes that may be used in products and self-products, one of the most important principles of the circular economy is applied: the industrial symbiosis.

Reuse can be done every time a material can be re-processed without compromising its performance and actually improving its value (upcycling). It is also a cultural breakthrough because artisans carry out the process, in small quantities, where imperfections are more and more acceptable, giving up unpleasant plastic surgery.

The circular economy shares also resources, technologies and knowledge because everything that is shared often optimizes production processes and generates efficiency; designers have been pioneers in sharing equipment, creativity and resources.

Sharing 3D printers (through fablabs, 2.0 services etc.) makes us think that another common denominator between product/designer and the circular economy is 3D printing, simplifying processes (planning, development and time to market are shortened), using measured matter (no waste), it can operate with renewable energy, it can employ recyclable matter, generate combinable but separable components from others... and above all contribute to regular reparation.

So, 3D printing that many makers love, activates maintenance/reparation of goods by generating a supporting spare parts service wherever the standard one were not available or inaccessible.

It could be one of the largest enemies of programmed obsolescence and those who believe in a future that regenerates goods rather than cannibalizing them ad infinitum may find this new system to their taste.

But 3D printing is also circular where it manages to use local resources (avoiding risks of volatile and geopolitically fragile material supplies) and designers are very sensitive to their local territories, and are particularly able to grasp social nuances, interpreting them with an open mind, often better than an organized business.

Regenerating a Community, not Just a Product

Pearls of Ecodesign The ecodesign principles defined in the Annex 1 of the Directive 2009/125/CE (ERP – Energy Related Products) envisaged: Minimization of material and energy consumption Reduction of use of dangerous goods

Smooth product and recycling and reuse Use of renewable, biocompatible and local resources Optimization of product life (therefore their life is extended) through easy updating, maintenance and little functional obsolescence Simplification disassembling operations of products

less waste production and reduction of use of resources less polluting and harmful process output and consumption less waste production with same performance effects on quantity and quality of generated waste less waste production with same performance over time

improvement of differentiation of waste types and ensuing increase of its quality

The social role of design should not be underestimated. In this respect, Alvaro Catalàn de Ocòn is particularly enlightening. With his Pet Lamp he teaches us that local traditions, an utmost and outstanding example of self-production, can still renew themselves through a more modern and smart self-production. They should not be destined to remain old-fashioned or kitsch as sometimes it happens in our mind. Quite the opposite, archetypal shapes can be re-connoted thanks to global strategies (PET bottles discarded everywhere) combining with local ones, giving a new sense to makers (who have always known them) regenerating a community and a trade, not just a product.

This is also the power of designing: regenerating a trade, thus carrying out a social role. This factor is in line with the circular economy because it optimizes human and social resources.

Last but not least, the hub revolution must also be mentioned. Such aggregation centres of widespread creativity and new supportive identities. Here designers are employed even less to design matter, but to plan processes and relations on territories, to invent new formulas to stimulate and convey creativity and resources, to think in a disruptive way, and therefor more able to imagine our future.

When we ask a product designer to talk about ecodesign or whether he is sensitive to the theme of sustainability he/she answers: “This is so last century! Today if you have not an eco approach to a project, you are invisible!”

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renewablematter 12. 2016

WINNERS and LOSERS

of a Circular Future edited by Joanna Dupont-Inglis

Those who will gain from the transtion to the cirular economy and those who will not. Obstacles to be removed. Factors to bet on. The opinion of four Euro-MPs who, through an examination of the EU Package, is organizing this very important step.

Joanna Dupont-Inglis in February 2009 joined EuropaBio, the European Association of bio-industries, and since April 2011 she has directed the industrial biotechnology field.

On the quest to develop a circular economy for Europe, leadership has now been passed from the European Commission to the Parliament and Council. With amendments drafted and discussions continuing in earnest, voting is due to take place in the coming months.

To gain a deeper insight into the priorities and objectives of the European Parliament we spoke with some of its most influential MEPs, spearheading work on the topic, including rapporteur on the Circular Economy Package Simona Bonafé (Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats) and shadow rapporteurs Josu Juaristi Abaunz from the European United Left/Nordic Green Left, Piernicola Pedicini, from the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy Group, and Nils Torvalds from Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.

Despite divergent political orientations, the answer to the key question of who or what stands to gain the most from

the adoption of a circular economy comes back loud and clear: the environment, the economy and European citizens.

But, important details still remain to be clarified, including the means to tackle barriers to market access for clean tech solutions, such as subsidies for carbon-intensive sectors, and how best to establish targets and measures to help reduce, reuse and recycle products and waste, without distorting markets or impacting jobs and growth.

The challenge, facing these thought leaders, will be to strike the right balance between ambitious objectives for the economy, the environment and its citizens with pragmatic solutions which can be implemented at national and regional level. Together they aim to craft policy which reigns in older, resource intensive industries whilst enabling emerging sustainable, competitive ones. In this edition of Renewable Matter they reveal some of their touchstones for delivering the economy of the future.

Simona Bonafè

©www.simonabonafe.eu

Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D)

Who, in your opinion, will be the “winners and losers” in the transition towards a circular economy?

“I would start by saying that today, in Europe, with the current linear economic system there are about 600 million tonnes of potentially reusable waste that loses value and is completely excluded from the production cycle with negative effects both on industrial competitiveness and environmental sustainability. Through promotion of reuse

and recycling we could move towards a production and consumption model able to turn these disadvantages into opportunities and benefits for the whole society. On the one hand, for instance, producers could benefit from cheaper raw materials and on the other, citizens would enjoy longer lasting products.

Data provided by the Commission are clear.

If we could obtain a reduction of productive factors’ needs, ranging from 17% to 24% by 2030, this would lead to a saving in the European

Policy Ms Bonafè is Rapporteur on the EU’s Circular Economy Package.

In this role Ms Bonafe is tasked with outlining Parliament’s position on the proposal and with representing MEPs during the trilogues with Commission and European Council.

As MEP, Ms Bonafè is a member of the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety committee and a substitute member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy.

industrial sector of 630 billion per year with a reduction of total greenhouse gases of 2-4%.

“On the contrary, losers will be those who will not understand the innovative drive of a transition towards the circular economy.

Probably they will not grasp it in the short-term, but in a few years they will see how consumers will prefer business models able to offer more reusable, repairable and recyclable products.”

Do you see a role for the bioeconomy within the circular economy? If yes, where do you see links do you between the two systems?

“The bioeconomy plays a crucial role within the circular economy. A more efficient use of urban waste could indeed become an important incentive for the bioeconomy supply chain; in particular I am referring to a sustainable management of organic waste, which could replace raw materials obtained using fossil fuels with renewable sources for the production of primary materials and products. To stimulate this model on a vast scale, and to promote the integration between bio-based industrial production and waste management, there is a need for a legislation on waste clearly setting out the objectives and resources required and evaluating how much public funding is needed to achieve them.”

The EU and Italy, in particular, is a world leader in developing and commercialising renewable, bio-based products – in an age of low oil prices and continued high subsidies of the fossil fuel industry what measures need to be put in place

to ensure the transition away from a linear and towards a circular, renewable economy.

“In Italy the bioeconomy sector employs about 7% of the total workforce and constantly growing. These are encouraging data indicating the worthiness of the policies adopted in the last few years. The Collegato Ambientale (“Environmental Bill”) provides a further push in this direction. I am referring to the new provisions on green public procurement for public administrations, the national scheme on the environmental footprint of products or incentives for companies producing goods from waste recovery.

“The next step to take is that of using tax leverage more rationally, rewarding products with a higher ‘circularity index’.”

How, in your opinon, the circular economy can redesign the “material landscape” of European economies?

Can we imagine different perspectives for the so-called “permament materials” – like glass and metals – to effectively promote the closed-loop recycling?

“Consumers themselves will influence the material landscape by choosing to buy products and materials that could be recycled and/or reused, that last longer and that can be easily repaired.

“The Legislator’s task is to create a clear legal framework reflecting priorities of waste hierarchy. This includes permanent materials which, thanks to their characteristics, can already adapt to the circular economy principles.

Growth rates in this sector (for example aluminium), confirm once again how consumers favour such characteristics.”

Josu Juaristi Abaunz

©WikiCommons / Euskal Herria Bildu

Confederal Group of the European United Left – Nordic Green Left

Who, in your opinion, will be the “winners and losers” in the transition towards an EU circular economy?

“Society, as a whole, stands to gain from the transition to an EU circular economy including citizens, business, the environment and public authorities. Moving from a linear to a circular economy will offer an opportunity to reinvent our economy, making it more sustainable and competitive. The environment will benefit as our resources will be enabled to re-enter the economic loop.

“Natural resources are finite, we are running out of them, and we need to keep in mind. In addition to this the Circular Economy will create new business opportunities linked, on the one hand,

to innovation and eco-design and on the other, to resource recovery and recycling facilities.

Moreover, citizens themselves will benefit from the economic and employment growth and from the opportunity to live in a healthier and more environmentally friendly Europe. Nevertheless, I would like to underline that this will only be completely achieved by amending the current proposal, especially regarding incineration; as not only landfilling, but also incineration plants are highly contaminating and are causing health problems. In our opinion, the final text should therefore narrow down the possibilities of the use of incineration to the minimum level, by measures such as banning the possibility of incinerating recyclables.

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renewablematter 12. 2016 Mr Juaristi Abaunz is a journalist who was elected as MEP for the GUE/NGL group in May 2014.

As MEP and member of the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety committee committee has worked on the circular economy, energy issues, radiation and transport emissions. Mr Juaristi Abaunz is also a substitute member on the Committee on Regional Development.

“However, we believe that transition should be without negative impact in the long run.

It’s true that some business sectors might suffer from some short-term economic problems in the adaptation phase, but those will be compensated in the long run. Moreover, it must be noted that these companies will receive assistance in the transition.”

Do you see a role for the bioeconomy within the circular economy? If yes, where do you see links do you between the two systems?

“Both concepts are linked, of course.

The bioeconomy is the response to the key environmental challenges that the world is already facing today. It is meant to reduce the dependence on natural resources, transform manufacturing, promote sustainable production of renewable resources from land, fisheries and aquaculture and their conversion into food, feed, fibre, bio-based products and bio-energy, while growing new jobs and industries.

We propose that resources are managed in a way that preserves their value and energy, thereby enabling a circular economy as well as reduced costs for public authorities and minimised environmental and health impacts.”

The EU is already a world leader in developing the technology to make renewable, bio-based products but it sometimes struggles to commercialise these in an age of low oil prices

and continued high subsidies of the fossil fuel industry. What key measures need to be put in place to ensure the transition away from a linear and towards a circular, renewable economy helping us meet our GHG emissions reductions targets?

“First of all, incentives should be given both to business and consumers to promote renewable and bio-based products. The creation of a secondary raw material market, with guaranties, is hence crucial to break the commercialisation blockade and access the market. Moreover, good product design and eco-design are a prerequisite to ensure a real transition to a circular economy; as it allows for embodied energy to stay in the system for longer effectively preserving the value of materials and enabling a circular economy that is resilient, creates local jobs and does not harm people. Where products cannot be reused, repaired, disassembled, remanufactured, recycled or composted they should be redesigned or progressively phased out from the market.

“Additionally, we can learn a great deal from examples of best practice. For example, between 2011 and 2015 the province of Gipuzkoa in the Basque Country almost doubled recycling rates in five years and made investing in an incineration plant obsolete. Gipuzkoa is living proof that a transition towards a circular economy system of resource management is possible.”

Piernicola Pedicini European Freedom and Direct Democracy Group (EFDD)

Who, in your opinion, will be the “winners and losers” in the transition towards a circular economy?

“EU citizens will be the main winners of the transition towards the circular economy in terms of better health and environment where we live.

The benefits are several, starting from better information on the environmental footprint of products which would allow consumers to make informed choices.

“In a circular economy, plans of obsolescence are phased out and citizens will not end up with broken products just after the end of the warranty period. The circular economy will incentivise producers to design longer lasting products which are easy to repair and recycle. The whole society will benefit from that as new green jobs will be created.

“Producers will also be winners in this transition as the circular economy will boost a market for secondary raw materials, creating better

access and decreasing their production costs. I would say that the only losers in this process will be those companies who want to continue extracting and exploiting resources in a linear economy, such as fossil fuels companies.”

Do you see a role for the bioeconomy within the circular economy? If yes, where do you see links do you between the two systems?

“The bioeconomy sector certainly plays an important role in reducing Europe’s dependency on fossil fuels. Because of its potential, new technologies and processes for the bioeconomy with a high sustainability potential should be promoted. The bioeconomy can provide for resource-efficient products and materials which are key in a circular economy, for instance sustainable wood can be used as substitute for non-renewable materials.”

Policy Mr Pedicini is a medical physicist and healthcare Director by background.

As MEP, he is a member of the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety committee, a substitute member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy and coordinator for the EFDD political group.

The EU is already a world leader in developing the technology to make renewable, bio-based products but it sometimes struggles to commercialise these. In an age of low oil prices and continued high subsidies of the fossil fuel industry what key measures need to be put in place to ensure the transition away from a linear and towards a circular, renewable economy helping us meet our GHG emissions reductions targets?

“In order to enable the transition towards a circular economy, the first most urgent measure to take is to eliminate all environmentally harmful subsidies, such as those to the fossil fuel sector as well as funds to incinerators.

“According to a study from the International Monetary Fund, in 2015, the EU spent €330 billion on fossil fuel subsidies. The same study highlights that eliminating subsidies in 2015 would help governments save €2,9 billion (corresponding to 3,6% of GDP), cut CO2 emissions of over 20%

and reduce premature deaths due to air pollution by 55%, thereby saving 1,6 million lives.

“Other essential measures to ensure the transition towards the circular economy are targets and indicators to measure resource consumption and the carbon footprint of products. Ecodesign standards are also essential to ensure that all products are resource-efficient, easy to reuse, repair, recycle and dismantle. The current revision of the waste legislation will be critical to improving waste management and towards establishing a waste hierarchy.

“Measures to improve waste prevention and reuse activities are also needed, along with a progressive phasing out of incineration and of the landfilling of waste.”

Nils Torvalds ©WikiCommons / Photo by David Iliff. Licence CC-BY-SA 3.0

Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe

Mr Torvalds is a Swedish-speaking Finn who has previously worked as a broadcast journalist and writer.

As MEP, Mr Torvalds is a member of the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety committee and a substitute member of five other committees including those on budgets, fisheries and economic and monetary affairs.

Who, in your opinion, will be the “winners and losers” in the transition towards a circular economy?

“I wouldn’t pick ‘winners and losers’ as such in this transition. The concept of the circular economy isn’t actually new, but is inherently logical: the need for efficient use of resources is still there, especially in a business perspective.

All of us could benefit from a more circular way of thinking. We should of course bear in mind especially the administrative effects of the transition to a circular economy – it should be easy, not burdensome, to do the ‘right’ thing.”

Do you see a role for the bioeconomy within the circular economy? If yes, where do you see links do you between the two systems?

“Most definitely. The meaning of ‘bioeconomy’ is something that easily changes depending on who you ask – what is the bioeconomy? There are a lot of technological (and environmental) breakthroughs out there, which are definitely contributing to the transition to a more circular economy. The link between ‘bio’ and ‘economy’ has been made, which many times can be beneficial. However, we should be careful about what we mean with ‘bio’ and what we use the brand for.”

The EU is already a world leader in developing the technology to make

renewable, bio-based products but it sometimes struggles nevertheless to commercialise these. In an age of low oil prices and continued high subsidies of the fossil fuel industry what key measures need to be put in place to ensure the transition away from a linear and towards a circular, renewable economy helping us meet our GHG emissions reductions targets?

“Clear, long- term and stable frameworks – both political and economic – are essential.

Because the legislative work is often slower than product or market development we, as legislators, have to be careful not to lock in solutions. This is of course demanding, as it is difficult to legislate for the future without exactly knowing what the future will look like.”

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Looking After Green Spaces with GPP Over the past years – ahead of its time – the municipalities of Barcelona and Lille decided to manage their public green spaces adopting environmental criteria. Here is the analysis of two cases that can act as models.

by Simona Faccioli

Simona Faccioli has dealt with GPP for years, first at ONR (national waste observatory) at the Ministry of Environment then as director for ReMade in Italy.

She is a member of the normative editorial staff of reteambiente.it.

Can GPP indeed represent the lever to unhinge the rigidity of the “productionconsumption-discard” model characteristic of a linear economy in order to bend it towards a circular one? It would seem so, especially if we look at the excellent GPP practices adopted in some European countries and the results they obtained for the environment and local economies.

The usefulness of GPP (Green Public Procurement) for the new desired model lies in the complex and structural reasons, of which the most intelligible is the widespread use of renewed materials, derived from waste recycling, which GPP hopes for and sometimes (for example in Italy)1 forces onto public administrations.

Indeed, if we go through European environmental criteria, one of the most widespread ones is the tendency to opt for materials and products with a minimal content of recycled materials.

True, GPP’s expectations are much broader, and perhaps despite its large adherence towards such type of “renewed” materials it does not make justice to its great environmental value, if we consider it from a structural viewpoint: suffice it to think about the impact of energy efficiency for energy-saving devices or the limitations on the use of harmful substances in products, with an influence on soil, air and food safety for the food that we eat.

For public areas, parks, schools, administration offices, hospitals, etc.

If we also consider good practices in Europe it is easy to see how these have made innovations possible in whole sectors, forcing suppliers to adopt specific environmental techniques, monitoring their application and verifying over time the effects on the ecosystem and the local area. So, a “virtuous circularity” of actions is started by both those companies deciding to orient their production towards eco-sustainability of products and services they offer

Wurmkos, Vestimi #2, performance.

Paduli Green belt, San Cassiano, Lecce, 2015

1. In Italy GPP became mandatory with the new Codice Appalti (Dlgs 50/2016 came into force 20th April 2016) mandating all public administrations to include “minimum environmental criteria” (i.e. CAM adopted by the Ministry for the Environment) in planning and public procurement documentation, according to minimum thresholds differentiated by category of services and purchases. For more information on GPP implementation in all European States please consult S. Faccioli, “An Europe At Full GPP”, Renewable Matter n. 11, July-August 2016 (www.renewablematter. eu/art/242/A_Europe_At_ Full_GPP).

and citizens-consumers, who emulate those actions in their consumption models compared to what has been implemented by consumerpublic administration.

Italy is the only European country to have gone so far as to introduce mandatory GPP for all contracting authorities, which must apply CAM (Criteri Ambientali Minini, “minimal environmental criteria”) released by the Ministry for the Environment.

Yet, both at Italian and European level, even going back some years, in some instances, GPP has been applied on a voluntary basis.

In this framework, we are going to analyse some GPP cases applied to a complex and diversified sector with various implications (environmental, economic and social), i.e. that of caring for public green spaces. Such sector offers a wide range of possible sustainable actions from an environmental point of view, going beyond the need to implement “resource circularity” (for instance of vegetable waste and water), involving some aspects regarding correct waste management, the use of potentially harmful substances, soil and air pollution and biodiversity care.

We will start with two concrete successful cases for European GPP which were noted by the

European Commission, so they can be regarded as models for similar applications: those implemented by the municipalities of Barcelona in Spain and Lille in France.

The scope of their application, resources used, measures introduced and benefits achieved are monitored.

In Barcelona, a Quintessential Park Management The Barcelona metropolitan area published a public procurement with an open procedure for the maintenance of parks in the whole area, which includes 36 municipalities, with a total surface of over 2 million square metres. The required services are gardening and maintenance of street furniture, pavements, structures and buildings placed within the area.

The value of the procurement is about €41 million in six years, spanning from 2014 to 2020.

With public procurement the environmental criteria on all phases of the service, not just waste management, but also for the use of sustainable products [...] and for the use of resources, have been imposed, which

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renewablematter 12. 2016 must be aimed at maximum efficiency.

As for cuts in noise and air emissions, requirements for the use of vehicles and gardening equipment have been imposed.

Moreover, the service, envisages particular care during the inspection phases by the contractor, monitoring of the performance by the administration, reporting of generated environmental effects and their communication.

As to waste management, specific requirements have been set for every fraction of waste produced (for example pruning, foliage, grass, muds), for their correct separate collection and in situ reuse as compost, fertilizer or for backfilling operations. The use of plastic bags is always prohibited.

Only environmentally sustainable products are allowed, specific criteria have been established especially for those harmful to the environment and health (paints, detergents, pesticides etc.) and for packaging.

First and foremost, all-around GPP: in the public procurement contractors are required to buy green products, eco-friendly products with known ecological quality labels (for example Ecolabel).

Contractors are also asked to use low-toxicity products, avoiding irritants, corrosives and products that may generate greenhouse gases and/or contain other dangerous components.

The use of products classified as very toxic, toxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic or that may interfere with the reproduction or that pose a threat of very serious irreversible effects after prolonged exposure is prohibited. Lubricants too are subject to specific requirements: for motor vehicles, the use of oils with at least 20% of regenerated base is mandatory.

If vehicles are used outdoors, oils must be biodegradable.

And particular attention is devoted to efficient use of energy and resources. Energy saving measures have also been put in place (for example with extensive use of LED), as well as water cuts, where widespread use of water economisers and monitoring systems for leaks are required.

In order to cut waste production, the use and impact of materials must be minimal: wherever possible, in canteens it would be better to use organic and biodegradable products; work uniforms should preferably contain natural and/or recycled fibres.

Contractors will have to promote the use of eco-labelled products (reliable and approved) and implement a policy for the respect of fundamental rights of workers.

Of course, any form of pollution should be kept to a minimum: emissions, dust and noise.

To this end, detailed requirements are specified with regard to the use of vehicles, machinery and equipment: documentation that the vehicle

must have, periodical checks and maintenance.

Not only that, there are more precise indications.

A few examples: engines must be kept on only for the time necessary to carry out the relevant operation and then switched off if not used for over five minutes; vehicles must be driven without sudden acceleration and at a reduced speed; in the case of wind, the use of materials that may generate dust should be avoided.

And what happens once the technical specifications of every phase of the service are set out?

The administration acknowledges the importance of constantly monitoring the contract, in order to verify its correct application and in order to single out more green criteria that may be added for the next procurement.

Every aspect of a contractor’s performance is carefully monitored and assessed on a monthly basis, through a kind of analysis determining the qualitative index (QI) taking into account every aspect of the service and associating it with its weight. For example: QI= 35% gardening + 15% furniture + 10% pavements + 15% services + 20% buildings + 5% service company.

If the result of the analysis determines a value lower than the minimum threshold set by the administration, the quality level is unacceptable or critical, resulting in the application of a penalty, according to the seriousness and type of discrepancy.

Lille, Hellemmes and Lomme: Public Procurement for Looking after Biodiversity Already in 2001, the city of Lille, with an Action Plan for sustainable development within Agenda 21,

Strong attention to biodiversity has led Lille to become France’s capital of biodiversity in 2012.

Policy introduced global objectives to promote biodiversity, reduce pollution, limit the use of pesticides and chemical products.

Such regulations have been transferred in 2012 to the documents of the public procurement about the maintenance of Lille’s green spaces and nearby communities of Hellemmes and Lomme.

The administration was not excessively demanding when they required participating companies to own an environmental management system, thinking that this could have discouraged them, shying them away from the procurement’s objective, which was to put into practice specific aspects of environmental sustainability and improve them throughout the contract.

Amongst the introduced environmental criteria, particular attention has been devoted to all aspects of the conservation of characteristics peculiar to the local area and care for biodiversity. With regard to the latter, bidders are required in-depth knowledge of the local area and its fauna, so as to preserve the best conditions for their conservation. To that end, for example, the implementation of the service envisages that natural corridors amongst habitats are created, so that animal movements are not hindered, and specific areas suitable as exclusive zones for some specimens are singled out so as to create suitable habitats, and deadwood heaps surrounded or covered by debris must be left in place.

With regard to livestock and grazing, it is mandated that specific measures to keep biodiversity and the group health (for example by mingling “old” breeds that have adapted to various diseases with different breeds) be taken. Moreover a buffer area with a water basin must be created, in order to guarantee the biodiversity of the species inhabiting it.

As for waste management, the public procurement’s procedure promotes a wider use of pruning and mowing products as compost and mulching to protect fields from solar radiation and erosion. Not only that: mulching and other materials used must be traceable and socially responsible.

Amongst the various environmental techniques particular rewarding points will be assigned in the case of advanced practices for land management and care for both vegetable and animal species including: •• census and monitoring of the origin of plants; •• introduction of sustainable methods for grass mowing, minimizing disturbance to animals; •• correct management of invasive vegetable species with non harmful products; •• reduction to a minimum of noise pollution due machinery use; •• use of alternative fuels; •• use of biodegradable oils coming from regeneration;

•• public awareness campaigns and communication activities to citizens, aimed at describing the biodiversity present in their local area and the importance of its conservation; •• introduction of monitoring systems and reduction of water consumption and, whenever possible, its reuse for irrigation.

Through the introduction of such measures and constant monitoring of their application, a considerable number of potentially harmful environmental impacts associated to keeping green areas have been mitigated during the implementation of the service, particularly soil and water pollution caused by pesticides.

In this regard, according to the government procurements the use of pesticides in all green areas of the municipality of Lille is expected to be phased out.

Strong attention to biodiversity has led Lille to become France’s capital of biodiversity in 2012. According to local administrators, an important factor contributing to the success of this procurement was market knowledge, allowing a suitable subdivision of the service.

The municipality believed in the effectiveness of leading by example: the spread of GPP practices – both for services carried out by the public administration and for those provided by outside companies – raises awareness towards citizens and users.

Good GPP Practices with CAP 2. www.remadeinitaly.it/cap

The good news is that in Italy a lot is being done with regard to GPP, in the wake of the mandate contained in Codice Appalti (public procurement code). The initiatives include the experience carried out by Cap Holding – managing the water system of the Milan area’s municipalities, particularly sensitive to all-around environmental sustainability policies – that last July conducted a field experiment, together with other associated municipalities (Abbiategrasso, Cesano Boscone, Cornaredo, Gorgonzola, Inveruno, Ossona, Segrate, Vanzago). In practice, people have been explained the rules and regulations and how to implement GPP, starting from a direct investigation of specific needs of the municipality, offering guidelines on how to integrate environmental requirements to some of the procedures of the expiring public procurements.

The experiment reached a model of a set of practical tools, collected in a handbook that can be useful for the implementation of similar cases. The Project, carried out with the support of Remade in Italy, is called “Cap for a new GPP”.2

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If It Becomes an

ONLINE WHIP-ROUND Overall, more than $34 billion were collected in 2015, of which 6.4 in Europe.

Such money financed researchers’ ideas, startuppers, musicians and writers as well as restoration work and solidarity projects. Italy is also closing the gap with its 69 operational crowdfunding platforms and 13 about to be launched.

by Silvia Zamboni

Silvia Zamboni is a professional journalist specialized in energy and environmental issues.

She has authored books on good practices of the green economy, mobility and development.

“1° Rapporto italiano sul CrowdInvesting,” tinyurl.com/hjsqlft

Do you remember the old “whip-round” we used to have amongst classmates to buy a present? Well, compare that to the viral potential of digital technologies, to Internet platforms and social media, to solidarity projects, to research or entrepreneurial initiatives looking to raise funds.

If you add a few zeros at the end you will get the number of people reachable online in the digital crowdfunding or fundraising for non profit or profit projects. A funding channel available all over the world offering visibility to a world of startuppers, researchers, musicians, designers, video-makers, writers and voluntary organisations. Sometimes even local administrations can be involved through neighbour crowdfunding, the so called civic crowdfunding for the collective funding of public works or programmes.

Due to the financial crisis (causing companies to look for alternative sources of funding) and the cancellation of risk-free returns (pushing investors towards new products) it is a world market that in 2014 was worth over $16 billion, 70% of which carried by peer2peer lending and distributed like so: 9.46 billion in North America and the US, 3.26 in Europe and 3.4 in Asia (source: “1° Rapporto italiano sul CrowdInvesting,” Politecnico di Milano).

A resource flow which, according to

the estimates by Massolution Crwodfunding Industry Report 2015, last year soared to $17.25 billion in North America and the USA, 6.40 in Europe and 10.54 in Asia.

Worldwide, American kickstarter.com is the leading platform of the reward-based crowdfunding where the money offers for published projects are rewarded with a non-financial gift, such as a gadget, a T-shirt or tickets for events. Or with and advance sale at a reduced price of the product if the fundraising initiative reaches the target to start production.

A little farther down, there is the other American giant, indiegogo.com, which has recently started its equity crowdfunding, where investors participate in the risk capital of start-ups by becoming a member.

In September 2016, kickstarter, now operating in Italy as well, had over 15 million donors.

Amongst the most popular projects there was a Ben Harkins – a deejay and developer of parlour games and software – with his unusual board game inspired by the planning or art glass windows for Sagrada Familia, the famous unfinished cathedral by Catalan architect Antoni Gaudì. With a collection of over $80,000, Harkins had more than trebled the amount requested. Fathom is another successful company specialized in sea explorations: for a high-definition portable and easily

Policy to 2014, when only 41 were operational.

The snapshot was taken by “Il crowdfunding in Italia. Report 2015,” a map of Italian platforms carried out by the University of Sacro Cuore in Milan, sponsored by Tim, started.it’s technical support and co-ordinated by Professor Ivana Pais, an expert of this phenomenon (see interview).

If the increase of players confirms the growing attention to alternative funding channels on the Internet, it also indicates a penalizing fragmentation. It is no coincidence that the incremental trend is accompanied by a high mortality rate of platforms.

As for revenue sources, commissions on transacted value ranks first, followed by the supply of paying advisory services, sponsorships and advertising.

Amongst the assessed platforms, Smartika and Prestiamoci – the two leading peer-to-peer social lending companies – have the most dynamic movement of money.

Kickstarter, www.kickstarter.com Indiegogo, www.indiegogo.com

“Il crowdfunding in Italia.

Report 2015,” tinyurl.com/zazp37a

For an in-depth analysis on social lending see S. Zamboni, “When Loans Go Social,” Renewable Matter 11 (tinyurl.com/zfewzag)

manageable underwater drone, promising to let you see the world through different eyes, it collected over $194,000, equal to 124% of the initial target.

Sabina Radeva also hit her target. After her degree in molecular biology at Max Planck Institute in Germany, she gave up research for a career as a graphic designer which is “more rewarding than her work in the lab,” as she sums up in her profile on kickstarter: after 46 days from the expiry of the publication of her announcement, her illustrated book to teach children the Darwin’s theory on natural selection she had exceeded her target by nine times. Put forward by Emily Hunt Turner, a young lawyer from New Orleans, the All Square stood out as well. It was a non-profit social-targeted project: a retailer of grilled cheese to offer jobs to people with a criminal record. Target: $50,000 for the usual start-up costs.

Zooming around Europe, the leading country is the United Kingdom, record holder in the field of equity crowdfunding. So far, the crowdcube.com platform alone has collected over £168 million.

Italy in Figures

Eppela, www.eppela.com/en

Starsup, www.starsup.it

In Italy, despite its head start at international level with produzionidalbasso.com, – a true international pioneer born in 2005, even before Facebook, to fund artistic self-productions, from music to the publishing industry, theatre and design – figures are lower, but they are picking up with some original elements as it will be explained below.

Overall, at the end of October 2015, in Italy there were 69 operational platforms and 13 were being launched, with an increase of 68% compared

With regard to the general reward-based crowdfunding, not specific to any project in particular, as opposed to, for example musicraiser.com, devoted to music initiatives, the leading platform in Italy is Lucca-based eppela.com. Created at the end of 2011, it has already ensured funds to over 2,500 projects and raised about €12 million. With almost 250,000 registered users and over 80,000 unique visitors per week, for contacts, projects and fundraising is top of the list in Italy and amongst the top five in Europe. Online projects range from comics and games, to art and design, cinema, theatre, technology and non profit social innovation. The pre-launch selection is very hard: “Out of the 60 proposals we receive on average every day, 90% is discarded, in order to guarantee the quality of those approved and to protect donors, financers,” points out Fabio Simonelli, Eppela’s member and project manager. A choice that up until now has paid off, since 60% of the campaigns reaches the target.

Moreover, Eppela is the benchmark platform for the crowdfunding initiatives of giants such as Poste Italiane, UnipolSai and Fastweb, with which it collected €1.5 million.

The Livorno-based starsup.it is the Italian leader in the equity crowdfunding sector.

“Our platform focuses on scientific and technological innovation,” explains Matteo Piras, one of the four members. “The sectors in which the start-ups we hosted operate are the green economy, pharmaceutical research, software, medical equipment, fashion, smart cities, nautical and mechanical sectors,” continues Matteo Piras. Started in January 2014, after fourteen closed projects (two are still underway) Starsup has six successful projects, for a total of €1,656,000. Amongst these, Cantiere Savona, which raised €380,000 for the development

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renewablematter 12. 2016 of a solar/thermal hybrid yacht and Enki Stove, with a total of 240,000 to produce ecological barbecues exploiting the open pyrolysis process.

Nova Samor has reached its target with its solar pumps NS1, a solar energy product absorbing radiation producing directly useful mechanical work, so as to eliminate losses to the passage from solar energy to photovoltaic electricity and end mechanical work.

In the USA and the United Kingdom there is a much more favourable fertile ground for innovative start-ups and the market of private financers. In Italy, people still carry on investing in bonds, insurances, real estate and debentures.

According to Piras, “a successful start-up profile must include the right mix of competence and experience, i.e. a team of young and more mature people. Another strategic factor is the reliability of the objective-budget: a pared-down estimate makes investors suspicious about the business plan reliability.”

Can the usual testimonial be of any help?

“To inspire confidence, projects need to be endorsed by a leading investor with a certain authority, such as a university incubator, an industrial partner, a professional investor or a so called business angel,” replies Piras. We asked him what he envies about the Anglo-Saxon world. “Everything! In the USA and the United Kingdom there is a much more favourable fertile ground for innovative start-ups and the market of private financers. In Italy, people still carry on investing in bonds, insurances, real estate and debentures.”

In Bologna, there is another innovative reward-based platform, founded by five women with a degree in management of creative cultural activities. Its name is Ginger, an acronym for Gestione Idee Nuove e Geniali (“Management of new and ingenious ideas”) for Emilia Romagna. It was the first in Europe to make this strategic choice, and its characteristic is that it is linked to the local area. Moreover, unlike some other “digital purists,” it encourages planners to make offline presentations as well, because as co-founder Agnese Agrizzi explains “face2face meetings help build a community of donors, starting from the so called friends and family, i.e. the closest people in the area.”

Ginger became famous with Un passo per San Luca (“A step for San Luca”), one of its first civic crowdfunding campaigns carried out in collaboration with the municipality of Bologna to co-finance the restoration of the colonnade of San Luca, three and a half kilometres of 17th century arcades climbing up a Bologna hill as far as the same-name basilica, a renowned destination for pilgrims and lay healthy walkers.

One of its trump cards that contributed to its success was the original contemporary art object offered as a reward: a huge plastic frog available in a range of colours. There are several successful solidarity stories such as the campaign Il mio nome è coraggio (“My name is courage”), launched by the parents of a girl with a rare genetic disease to cover the costs to alleviate her physical pain and promote her primary physiological functions. The reaction

of the over five hundred donors was extraordinary: the target of €15,000 was doubled.

The already mentioned produzionidalbasso. com, up until now has raised €3,154,254 for over 1,400 projects. Recently it hosted Che aria tira? (“Which way is the wind blowing?”). A project of DIY air quality monitoring devices, an initiative promoted in Florence by Mamme no inceneritore (“Mothers against incinerators”).

Then there are platforms devoted to the usual donations such as retedeldono.it and iodono. com, that after the island was flooded, it hosted the project È ora della solidarietà: emergenza Sardegna (“It is time for solidarity: Emergency Sardinia”). It raised €138,896.

Mistakes To Avoid But what are the most common mistakes to be avoided in order not to let the collection fail? “Upload the projects without involving before, during and after the campaign the target community of donors, deluding yourself that money will arrive as if by magic. Another mistake: a poor presentation of the project, not accompanied by a video, which must be brief, fresh and effective, where the project maker commits himself conveying his/her enthusiasm for his/her proposal; an offer of trivial and not palatable rewards,” explains Giacomo Cassinese who in April organized Crowdfest, the first Italian festival to make crowdfunding known and put online all protagonists, “since everyone does their own thing, while there is a need for interaction to spread culture,” he complains.

As for current and future opportunities for crowdfunding in Italy, its weakness, according to Agrizzi, is due to little awareness that culture, art, creative and young companies are essential components of society, and such insensitivity makes people less inclined to donate, aggravated by the digital divide and diffidence for purchases and online payments with credit card. That’s why Ginger encourages the offline fundraising throughout events and it has introduced donations via bank transfer. Otherwise, there are two positive signs: “Some leading platforms are shaping up, a trend that will help overcome fragmentation. Moreover, universities, incubators, foundations and trade associations invite us to hold workshops on crowdfunding, because people finally understand that in order to be effective the right know-how is needed.”

Simonelli thinks positive as well: “In Italy there are quite a lot of smartphones, so if digital illiteracy is a discouraging factor, with regard to mobile phones there is no digital divide.

This is what we need to work on” he remarks.

Policy Interview

edited by S. Z.

Crowdfunding: This is How to Build a Successful Project Ivana Pais, Professor of Economic Sociology at the Faculty of Economics at Università Cattolica

An expert in social network and digital professional communities, co-author of the volume Crowdfunding.

La via collaborativa all’imprenditorialità (Egea, 2014), Ivana Pais is Associate Professor of Economic Sociology at the Faculty of Economics at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan.

Here is her opinion on the subject.

According to the figures available, the Anglo-Saxon countries are the world leaders in crowdfunding? How is that?

“Since it is not a matter of either or with regard to conventional funding channels but rather a complementary channel, in the Anglosaxon world characterized by a society where people are more used to digital tools, where the venture capital chain is quite developed, where private investments and funding to companies are common and where the entrepreneurial world is strongly oriented towards innovation, crowdfunding thrives, while it struggles where this venture capital fabric is lacking.”

Recent estimates show that Asian markets are emerging.

“In terms of numbers the latest international reports show a strong growth of the Chinese market, of which we have not yet fully understood the scope nor its success, although it goes without saying that the number of people visiting platforms affects overall performance. And the Chinese population exceeding one billion is certainly an extraordinary reservoir.”

As for the Italian market, what are the strengths of Italy’s crowdfunding?

“Strong attention to social issues. Perhaps it is not a strength, strictly speaking, but it is a distinctive feature compared to more business oriented Anglo-Saxon platforms.”

And what about its weaknesses?

“Italy’s socioeconomic structure is still resistant to digital payments. Moreover, there is an element of structural weakness of a linguistic nature: an English platform can access a much larger market compared to an Italian one.”

What are the characteristics of a successful project?

“From our analysis of third sector projects, funds tend to be allocated to circumscribed projects, with a good visibility on social networks and in particular on twitter. Also, those describing themselves with a video, which is common practice abroad but not in Italy.”

What is the classic profile of a platform viewer?

“The basic difference is between those investing (equity crowdfunding), those pre-purchasing an object (reward-based) and those donating.

The common features are access to the Internet and electronic payment and money availability.

So, it is not an environment for boys, but it is mostly frequented by males, especially from Northern Italy, while women have their say in donations.”

Can you see any links between crowdfunding and the circular economy?

“Not direct ones. And yet in their presentation, many of the funded products show strong attention to reuse of materials and aspects of sustainability as values around which the community should be built. The rationale behind crowdfunding and what sets it apart from venture capital is the building of communities around a variety of shared sensitivities.

In this respect, the circular economy acts as a binding factor.”

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Dossier

CANADA With 348 million hectares of forests and 67 million of agricultural land, biomass has always played a key role in the Canadian economy. But the true challenge has been to combine this resource with innovation. This formula is proving successful for the development of the country.

Supported by:

Policy

FROM MAPLE TREES edited by Mario Bonaccorso

to Biorefineries

Canada is home to 10% of the world’s forests. At the core of a new sustainable development model, today, the bioeconomy already attracts a lot of foreign investors.

And many Canadian companies are also active in this sector.

Mario Bonaccorso is a journalist and creator of the Bioeconomista blog. He works for Assobiotec, the Italian association for the development of biotechnologies.

Bioindustrial Innovation Canada, www.bincanada.ca

Great availability of renewable raw materials, institutional infrastructure and support: These are the ingredients that make Canada one of the major players in the bioeconomy sector at global level.

It could not be any different for a country where the maple leaf, also included in its flag, is the national symbol. Canadian forests cover 348 million hectares making up 10% of global forests. Instead, agricultural land occupies 67 million hectares. “Agricultural and forestry biomass plays a crucial role in the development of the Canadian bioeconomy,” tells us Murray McLaughlin, executive director of Bioindustrial Innovation Canada until last June, one of the most important research and marketing centres focussed on the bioeconomy. “Companies are developing innovations to transform wood into sugars and to expand the use of lignin.”

A Strategy by the End of the Year In Canada, the bioeconomy is currently at the core of a new model of sustainable development vigorously supported by Justin Trudeau’s government, which puts the fight against climate change at the top of its political agenda. Taking part in COP21 in Paris acted as the driving force for drawing up a national plan for the bioeconomy that should be submitted in its draft form for public discussion by the end of the year. In this scenario, it will be a difficult task to reconcile the interests of the bioeconomy

with those of the oil industry present in Canada, since the country is currently home to the third largest proven oil resources at global level after Saudi Arabia and Venezuela (Source: BP Statistics).

It will be a difficult task to reconcile the interests of the bioeconomy with those of the oil industry present in Canada since the country is home to the third largest proven oil resources at global level.

“It is essential” McLaughlin highlights, “if we want to achieve the targets set by our government. In Sarnia we talk about hybrid clusters, in other words bio-based and oil-based products must be processed together to make the bioeconomy grow and to extend the life of our oil resources by limiting their use. But at the moment there are no real policies to promote such collaboration.”

The peculiarity of Canada’s oil resources, experts claim, is that, unlike traditional oilfields, in the North American country this resource is extracted mainly from the so-called tar sands.

This kind of oil is very difficult to extract and refine; tar sands are a mixture of clay, water, sand, mud and bitumen. Since this oil is either in its solid or semisolid form, its processing is very costly, not only from an economic but also from an environmental point of view.

If in order to obtain a barrel of conventional oil, 29 Kg of CO2 are produced, for a barrel of oil from tar sands it goes up to about 125. Therefore, experts estimate that 44% of greenhouse gases

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renewablematter 12. 2016 Therefore, experts estimate that 44% of greenhouse gases produced in Canada between 2006 and 2020 will be caused by the extraction and production of oil from tar sands.

produced in Canada between 2006 and 2020 will be caused by the extraction and production of oil from tar sands.

This makes it clear why it is important to adopt a plan for the bioeconomy as soon as possible.

In Paris, the Canadian government pledged to reduce its CO2 emissions by 30% compared to 2005 emissions by 2030. This means, according to experts, only one thing: a total conversion to renewable energy in the next 35 years in order to remain within the 1.5 °C target.

A few extra years for the 2 °C target. All this requires the immediate shutdown of coal-fired power stations. A measure already adopted in Ontario in 2014, replacing coal with wood, and Alberta will do the same by 2020. “Other provinces,” McLaughlin says, “are revising their plans.”

In Canada, the role of provinces in the bioeconomy is extremely important: they are responsible for energy and environmental policies. Some, such as Alberta and British Columbia, have already introduced a carbon tax in their tax system. Others, such as Ontario and Quebec, are working on the implementation of new policies limiting the use of coal.

Moreover, in order to guarantee a homogenous framework, the federal government is developing national guidelines that should be introduced by 2017. “Canadian bioeconomy players hope” McLaughlin says, “that the plan for the bioeconomy will include also a green procurement system promoting the spread of bioproducts, similar to the Biopreferred programme introduced in the USA.” Attracting Investments

Comet Biorefining, cometbiorefining.com/

Despite not having a national plan, Canada has been able to attract several investors in its territory over the past few years. “Some local initiatives have promoted the development of the bioeconomy,” McLaughlin states. Some examples? “In Sarnia in Ontario, they focussed on biobased chemical products; in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on biocomposites; and in Drayton Valley, Alberta, on wood biomass.”

“In Alberta,” Stan Blade, dean of the Faculty of Agriculture at Alberta University, confirms, “we have several programmes to promote the development of bioenergy, both from an infrastructural point of view and granting of subsidized loans.”

Moreover, Canada has numerous assets propitious to the bioeconomy: a wealth of biomass, certified forests, highly skilled workforce, excellent research and funds made available by the Sustainable Development Technology Canada Agency, closeness to the USA market and presence of industrial sites where pilot and commercial plants can be located.

It is no accident then that a company such as

American BioAmber, which produces biobased succinic acid, decided to open its commercial plant in Sarnia. “The main reason,” explains Mike Hartmann, BioAmber vice executive president, “is the low cost of sugar and energy.”

Succinic acid is a chemical intermediate with a plethora of applications in the field of food ingredients, personal care, paints and biodegradable plastics. “Currently, succinic acid,” Hartmann claims, “has a market worth 60,000 tonnes and, according to estimates, it is growing by 35% per year.” In Sarnia, the Delaware company, listed both on Nasdaq and on Euronext in Paris, with its headquarters in Montreal (Quebec) in 2015 built and opened a 30,000-tonnes-a-year plant, that will reduce CO2 emissions by 210,000 tonnes compared to those deriving from the production of the equivalent quantity of oil-based acid.

This amounts to eliminating 45,000 cars.

Investors in this company include Japanese giant Mitsui & Co., which owns 40% of its capital stock, German Lanxess and some venture capital funds such as French Sofinnova and Canadian Cliffton Group.

Canadian Companies In 2008, Comet Biorefining also opened its commercial plant in Sarnia. This Canadian company has developed a technology for the sustainable production from non-food biomass of cellulosic glucose to be used in biofuels and biobased chemical products.

“Canada,” claims Andrew Richard, founder and president of Comet Biorefining, “is at the forefront in the bioeconomy sector.

There is a high degree of allignment amongst Canadian government agencies supporting these sectors. Whether it is the agricultural and forest sector supporting agencies, innovation and technological programmes, such as SDTC (Sustainable Development Technology Canada), or local initiatives for economic development, each programme is well defined and targets complement each

BEN Members Here is a list of the Bio-Economy Network members: •• Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Association; •• BIOTECanada; •• Canadian Bioenergy Association (CanBio); •• Canadian Renewable Fuels Association; •• Chemistry Industry Association of Canada; •• CropLife Canada; •• Forest Products Association of Canada; •• FPInnovations; •• Bioindustrial Innovation Canada / Sustainable Chemistry Alliance.

Policy Funds for Innovation Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC) is a non-profit foundation funding and supporting the development and demonstration of clean technologies able to offer solutions to climate change problems, clean air, water and soil quality while guaranteeing economic, environmental and health benefits to Canadians. SDTC manages two funds for the development and demonstration of innovative technological solutions.

Enerkem’s technology used in the Edmonton plant opened in June 2014 enabled the Canadian city to increase its waste diversion percentage from 60 to 90% producing ethanol and methanol.

SD Tech Fund •• Total project budget: Can$ 550 million; •• Forgivable loans.

NextGen Biofuels Fund •• Total project budget: Can$ 500 million; •• It provides equity financing; •• Loans must be repaid on a free cash flow basis over a 10-year period after completion of the project.

Enerkem, enerkem.com/

other. This alignment is a great advantage that enables companies to make the most of funding opportunities and development policies.”

Building the plant of the company managed by Richard was made possible thanks to a Can$ 10.9 million loan by SDTC. Comet investors also include French capital venture fund Sofinnova and BioAmber itself, which in April last year signed a commercial agreement with the Ontario-based company for the supply of dextrose.

Quebec Enerkem is another pride and joy of the Canadian bioeconomy. It is gaining a starring role at global level thanks to its technology for the production of biofuels and biochemicals using solid urban waste as raw material. Founded in 2000 by Esteban Chornet and his son Vincent, who is currently its president and managing director, the company opened its first pilot plant in 2003 in Sherbrooke in Quebec. Afterwards, in 2007 it started building a demonstration plant in Westbury and in 2010 its first commercial plant in Edmonton (Alberta) was opened and in 2012 its second one in Varennes (Quebec).

Enerkem’s technology used in the Edmonton plant opened in June 2014 enabled the Canadian city to increase its waste diversion percentage from 60 to 90% producing ethanol and methanol.

For this reason, the biorefinery – which last year was the first refinery to be awarded

the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC) for the production of biomethanol from solid urban waste – is considered by experts a true model of the circular bioeconomy that the chemical giant AkzoNobel and other partners would like to copy in the Netherlands. In the meantime, in China, Qingdao City Construction Investment Group is thinking about building a biorefinery that will use Enerkem’s technology.

“ISCC certification,” claimed Tim Češare, senior vice president, business development, “proves that Enerkem meets the environmental and social sustainability requirements. Enerkem already sells its biomethanol to North America and thanks to this certification it is adding flexibility to export it as biofuel to Europe” (a third party certification is required by the strict measures dictated by the European Renewable Energy Directive, editor’s note).

The Role of the Bio-Economy Network According to an analysis presented to the Canadian Ministry of Agriculture and Agribusiness (Bioproducts Survey, Statistics Canada), in 2009 over 200 Canadian companies were developing or producing bioproducts, with more than 3.000 employees and a Can$ 1.3 billion turnover (export amounting to 433 million). The total of biomass produced amounted to 27 million tonnes. Of course, these numbers must be updated, but they give us an idea of a country where the bioeconomy represents a sector with huge growth potential seen by the government as an excellent opportunity to strengthen and diversify the agricultural sector transforming production waste into high added-value products.

To fully exploit this potential, the Ministry of Agriculture created an interdepartmental working group on the bioeconomy (BIWG, Bioeconomy Interdepartmental Working Group), clustering together federal departments and agencies in order to coordinate all policies in this sector. An initiative that in 2012 was embraced by the Bio-Economy Network (BEN), a network of Canadian bioeconomy stakeholders aiming at fully exploiting this emerging potential in the global market for biobased products and to which the federal government has recently entrusted the task of drawing up the first draft of the national plan for the bioeconomy. “We have witnessed the aggressive bioeconomy policy of the USA, China and Europe and we do not want to be left out,” declared Catherine Cobden, Canadian Association for Forest Products executive vice president, who was appointed president of BEN. “We do not want,” she said, “Canada to end up in a vulnerable position in an increasingly competitive environment. Here in Canada we have natural resources that other countries can only dream of. We want to work beyond traditional limits and prepare our country for the future.”

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renewablematter 12. 2016 Interview

edited by M. B.

The Future Starts from Forests Glenn Mason, Canadian Forest Service, Assistant Deputy Minister, Natural Resources Canada

Canadian Council of Forest Ministers, www.ccfm.org/english/

Mr Mason, Canada has 348 million hectares of forest land: what role does the forest industry play in the Canadian bioeconomy?

“Canada’s 348M hectares of forests mean the country has one of the largest biomass resources in the world. While the country only harvests less than 0.5% of its forests annually, the processing of this wood generates between 28 and 32 million tonnes (500 million GJ) of sawmill residues each year. Increasingly, new uses are also being found for by-products of pulp and paper manufacturing, such as lignin.

“The forest sector can therefore make significant contributions to the Canadian bioeconomy: technological advances in the use and transformation of wood fibre into energy, fuel, chemicals, or advanced materials constantly supply new opportunities to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emission, secure long-term carbon storage, and provide economic sustainability in rural areas.

We see a key role for the forest sector in Canada’s future.”

In order to reach the target to reduce emissions 30% below 2005 levels by 2030 and to stay below the 1.5 °C mark, Canadian government must commit to moving immediately to eliminate coal-fired power, ramp up investment in renewable energy and in the bioeconomy. How are you planning to make it possible?

“Our goal in Canada is to support all the different aspects of the bioeconomy. First, Canada supports in the robust science that informs life cycle analysis and carbon accounting of forest.

Second, Canada fosters the creation and commercialization of innovative products and technologies with government funding supporting all stages of the innovation continuum from fundamental science, to R&D and commercialization. The domains covered are as varied as bioenergy, construction, advanced materials, or platform chemicals.

“However, as you mentioned, energy is the first frontier for the development of the bioeconomy since it offers some of the highest potential for GHG mitigation. In a joint statement with the US, Canada has committed to ‘develop and share a plan and timeline for deploying innovative renewable energy and efficiency alternatives to diesel and advance community climate change adaptation’.”

What are the priorities in the action plan of the Canadian government?

“The Government of Canada is clearly committed

to ‘Protecting the environment and growing the economy’ at the same time. Priorities include reducing carbon pollution and combating climate change, and making strategic investments in clean technology. The federal government priorities have translated into a number of collaborations and funding commitment for the next 2 to 10 years that will advance biofuels and the bioeconomy thanks to large investments into infrastructure, clean technology for natural resources sectors, and a low carbon economy fund.

“Finally, Canada is developing a Forest Bioeconomy Framework through the Canadian Council of Forest Ministers (CCFM). The Framework is part of the CCFM’s Innovation Action Plan for the next four years.”

Which are the policies you have now in Canada to support the bioeconomy?

“Canadian Federal, Provincial and Territorial Governments, have enacted a number of policies and programs over the past 10 years to support the development of the Canadian bioeconomy.

“The Federal Government of Canada has Renewable Fuel Regulations, which specify annual average renewable content in gasoline, diesel fuel and heating oil. Some Canadian provinces have regulations going above and beyond the federal mandates.

“In addition, the federal government supports the development of bioenergy and bioeconomy through a variety of programs and grants working with industry in research, technology and feedstock development, as well as demonstration projects.

“Some recent examples of Federal programs include: The Investment in Forest Industry Transformation (IFIT) program provides $100 million over four years for projects that implement new technologies leading to non-traditional high-value forest products and renewable energies.

The ecoEnergy for Biofuels program will invest $1.5 billion in order to bolster the production of renewable alternatives to gasoline and diesel, and encourage the development of a competitive domestic industry for renewable fuels. Growing Forward 2 is a policy framework developed for Canada’s agricultural and agri-food sector representing a $3 billion dollar investment over 5 years (2013-2018) by federal, provincial and territorial (FPT) governments in programs that focus on innovation, competitiveness and market development. The framework will help Canadian producers and processors continue to innovate and capitalize on emerging market opportunities.

Policy Several provinces are also pursuing the development of their own bioeconomy strategies.”

The Canadian Trade Commissioner Service, “Why Invest in Canada?” tinyurl.com/pyp9yyo

Canada is the world’s third largest holder of oil reserves after Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. It is also the third producer of natural gas at global level. How is it possible to reconcile the interests of these sectors with those of the bioeconomy?

“Advancing the bioeconomy will not be an easy task, nor can anyone stakeholder accomplish it alone.

There is still a need to develop a cross-sectoral innovation system that seeks to align the interests and goals of various sectors. For example, recent advancements in biomass hydrothermal conversion technologies can facilitate the production of renewable bio-crude, a product that could be sustainably produced in existing refineries to yield a suite of biofuels and biochemicals. Governments and industry will need to work together to develop a vision for the bioeconomy so that efforts are aligned and mutually supportive.”

Are there measures such as Green Public Procurement and carbon tax in the Canadian policy system?

“The Government of Canada Policy on Green Procurement came into effect on April 1, 2006.

The policy seeks to advance the protection of the environment and support sustainable development by integrating environmental performance considerations into the procurement decision-making process. The policy requires that federal departments integrate environmental performance considerations as a key factor in procurement decisions. Departments are also required to establish green procurement targets and monitor and report on their green procurement performance annually.

“As a key priority, the Government of Canada is working to provide national leadership in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, combat climate change, and price carbon. In partnership with provinces and territories, the Government of Canada is working to ensure that the provinces and territories have the flexibility to design their own carbon pricing policies.

These policies will recognize the economic cost and impact that a greater-than-two-degree increase in average global temperatures would represent.”

Canada has shown a strong ability to attract investments by the bioeconomy companies.

What are the strengths of your country?

“First, Canada is a recognized world-leader in the sustainable management of our forests. As of 2015, Canada had the largest area of third-party-certified forests in the world: 166 million hectares. Sustainable forest management in Canada is supported by laws, regulations and policies; a rigorous forest management planning process; and a science-based approach to decision-making, assessment and planning. Investment in Canada is attractive because of Canada’s reputation as a source of legally and sustainably produced forest products and biomass.

Canada also has world-class scientific research and a highly educated workforce. Canadian researchers and scientists have uncovered two new revolutionary forest bio-materials, known as cellulose filaments and cellulose nanocrystals, with the potential of helping position Canada’s forest sector at the forefront of the global bioeconomy.

“Canada also has sound legislation and a stable business environment. Canada has a history of strong trade relations with many countries, and foreign investors in Canada will also have preferential access through the North American Free Trade Agreement and other trade agreements. Canada has the lowest total business tax costs in the G-7.”

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Photo by Enerlab

Photo by Kruger

Dossier Canada

2

An Industrial 1

REBIRTH

US$15 billion per year, this is how much Canada’s forest sector is worth.

How Canada’s forest industry transformed itself from a world-leading natural resource supplier into a producer of innovative and sustainable biomaterials. edited by Global Affairs Ministry Canada & Natural Resources Canada

FPInnovations, fpinnovations.ca/Pages/ index.aspx

Yet for all the focus placed on Canada as a resource-rich country, another story deserves to be told. This one talks of transformation and innovation, of adaptation in the face of adversity and of the commercialization of change.

Its main character is Canada’s forest sector, a segment of the economy that is worth about US$15 billion annually, and which provides direct employment to 195,000 people.

new growth opportunities emerged. Government and private industry rallied together, with contributions from academia and other research organizations, to create FPInnovations, the world’s largest public-private forest research organization. In turn, the partners have enabled a new era of investment and innovation among Canada’s forest sector entities.

After the Fire, Rebirth

As a result, Canada’s forest industry has complemented its suite of conventional, resource-focused products with new, highervalue opportunities for developing innovative bioproducts, which underpin an emerging bioeconomy: biogas, cellulose nanocrystals, and other feedstocks for products such as fuels, chemicals and materials.

Canadian producers have created these bioproducts – and many more – principally using forest biomass. Because the technologies used to create these bioproducts often enable greenhouse gas emissions reductions and other environmental benefits, they have the potential to improve the environmental performance

For generations, our forest sector enjoyed a great deal of success as a low-cost producer and supplier to the world. Yet in the latter part of the 2000s, a series of economic shocks changed much of the industry’s reality and its thinking. The American housing market, upon which so much of Canada’s forest exports depended, collapsed. Demand for newsprint declined. Canada’s dollar rose to above parity with its American counterpart, and competition emerged from other countries that could produce comparable forest products at lower costs.

In the wake of these industry-shifting pressures,

A Triple Win: New Products, Cleaner Technology, More Jobs

Photo by Corruven Photo by TTS

5

4 1. Enerlab 2000 Inc. ISO-LIGNIN foam being sprayed to create a high performance insulation board with customizable properties such as fire resistance and specific densities

2. Kruger BioMaterials Inc. FiloCell® cellulose filaments – an innovative bio-based material that brings strength, lightness and other benefits to plastics, concrete, paper and many other products

3. Miller Western Three anaerobic hybrid digester tanks will convert organics in mill effluent into bio-energy for pulp mill use

of Canada’s economy as a whole. Additionally, the development and application of these new technologies is supporting Canada’s competitiveness on the world stage and creating jobs in communities across the country.

All of this change is being implemented responsibly. Our forest industry is opening new product markets while mitigating unintended consequences through sustainable forestmanagement practices.

3

Kruger Biomaterials: From Newspaper to Biomaterials

Kruger Biomaterials, biomaterials.kruger.com/en

Kruger Biomaterials is one of many examples of a Canadian forest company that underwent change. Until recently, its mill in Trois-Rivières Quebec was dedicated to the production of newsprint. The company turned out 360,000 metric tonnes of the product annually. But as product sales declined worldwide, the company, with assistance from FPInnovations, bet heavily on creating new products.

In 2014, Kruger built the world’s first commercialscale facility that produces cellulose filaments – a biomaterial with unique strengthening properties. Its FiloCell cellulose filaments are obtained by mechanically peeling wood fibres into very thin and long strands. The process produces a flexible, ultra-lightweight material with exceptional bonding capacities. In turn, FiloCell can be used to reinforce many materials such as thermoplastics, concrete, adhesives, non-woven fabrics and coatings.

Equivalent Triumphs: Enerlab, AE Côte-Nord, Corruven, Tekle and Millar Western

Enerlab, www.enerlab.ca

Happily, Kruger’s story is not unique. Similar narratives are being played out across the country.

In nearby St-Mathieu de Beloeil, Quebec, for example, insulation-product manufacturer

4. Tekle Technical Services Inc. Engineered fibre mats made from wood waste fibre are molded into interior car panels

5. Corruven Canada Inc. Corruven’s lightweight composite panel has wide application potential in the building materials, furniture, and transportation sectors

Enerlab 2000 Inc. has developed a process by which it can build new insulating and structural building panels using wood-based lignin (a pulping process by-product) as opposed to petroleum-based inputs.

Enerlab’s processes turn organic lignin into polyurethanes. These, in turn, can be manufactured into different forms, from very low-density foams to high-performance composites. Enerlab’s products can be used for flexible high-resilience foam seating, rigid foam insulation panels, high performance adhesives, surface coatings, packaging, surface sealants and synthetic fibres.

In the years ahead, Enerlab 2000 will develop a new production line that can manufacture up to 10 million board feet of different structural panel types. These can help to reduce a building’s raw materials costs by as much as 20%, decrease its environmental footprint, and satisfy consumer demand for eco-friendly polyurethane-based building materials.

Also in Quebec, three companies have forged a partnership to convert forest waste into fuel.

Ensyn Bioenergy Canada, Arbec Forest Products and Rémabec Group have created a new company, AE Côte-Nord Canada Bioenergy Inc., which is building the world’s first commercial facility for Rapid Thermal Processing (RTP) technology.

RTP is a proprietary process that converts forest residues to liquid biocrude.

Once complete, the facility will convert approximately 65,000 metric tonnes of sawmill residue into approximately 40 million litres of biocrude annually. Drawing on this fuel for energy purposes, users could reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by approximately 70 to 90%.

Additionally, the plant will create approximately 30 direct jobs and many more indirect jobs for the community.

In New Brunswick, on Canada’s Atlantic coast, Corruven Inc., a leading edge business-to-

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renewablematter 12. 2016

Kenora Declaration on Forest Innovation, www.ccfm.org/pdf/ Declaration_E.pdf

Natural Resources Canada, www.nrcan.gc.ca/home

For more information, visit www.forest-transformation. nrcan.gc.ca.

business technology provider for product manufacturers in several industries, such as building materials, transportation and furniture, has developed the world’s first corrugated wood composite product from low grade wood fibre.

The product combines wood’s natural strengths with green chemistry and a corrugated shape.

It can be used as a performance packaging solution, a new generation bed platform, and as a core material in the architectural and construction industries.

Compared with standard composite wood panels, Corruven core panels require 60% less wood, 40% less energy and 40% less resin to produce.

On the other side of the country, in Alberta, Tekle Technical Services (TTS) has created a new manufacturing process to produce the world’s first engineered fibre mat for use in automotive manufacturing and green building applications.

Its process enables wood residues and agricultural fibres to be made into ultra-lightweight interior trim car parts and advanced, environmentally friendly building materials.

TTS’s spinoff company, Biocomposites Group, was created in Alberta’s Drayton Valley region to function as an independent commercial operation.

At capacity, the company is expected to create as many as 20 new jobs. It will also help to reduce demand for fibreglass and petrochemical-derived plastics, and could offset emissions of up to 50,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas.

TTS’s lab and pilot operation in Edmonton, Alberta continues to develop applications of fibre mat and associated sustainable biocomposites for other industries such as the building and furniture industries, thereby creating a number of important opportunities for Canadians and the forest industry.

Finally, at its pulp mill in nearby Whitecourt, Alberta, Millar Western Forest Products Ltd. will soon become the first company in Canada to employ innovative anaerobic hybrid digester technology to improve effluent treatment and generate bioenergy.

Millar Western will use its digester technology to produce a methane-rich biogas that, in turn, will be used to fire reciprocating engines in a power station. The new anaerobic system is expected to produce enough biogas to generate 5.2 megawatts (MW) of renewable electricity and cut power consumption at the mill by a further 1.6 MW. The total energy savings equate to the amount of electricity consumed by more than 6,500 homes annually.

The project will deliver further environmental benefits. Direct greenhouse gas emissions will decline by 10,300 tonnes annually, water intake will drop by 10%, and sludge production will fall by 40%. It will also improve the quality of effluent discharges into the Athabasca River by reducing organics content by 65%. Finally, and no less significantly, the project will reduce operating costs and lessen pressure on the existing effluent treatment system, thus making the pulp mill more competitive and improving its long-term viability.

The Way Forward: the Kenora Declaration If Canada’s forest industry has its way, the stories of Tekle, Enerlab, AE Côte-Nord, Corruven, Kruger and Millar Western will not be unique.

The Canadian Council of Forest Ministers (CCFM) recently endorsed a declaration to support and advance innovation in the forest sector.

The Kenora Declaration, as it is known, was endorsed in July 2015 by nearly 70 stakeholders from government, academia and the private sector. An action plan followed in June 2016. The document will guide the sector through 2020 to further strengthen its presence in the emerging bioproducts, bioenergy and biomaterials industries, and to realize further economic development opportunities across Canada.

Three pillars support the Kenora Declaration.

The first, collaboration, calls for key forestsector players such as businesses, employees, government and researchers to collaborate on innovation, reduce duplication and cross pollinate ideas in order to yield the maximum benefits. Collaboration is particularly significant given that the producers of Canada’s forest products are considered relatively small compared to their global competitors. Only by working together can they capture a larger share of the global market.

Engagement is the second pillar of the declaration.

Our forest sector is targeting engagement with non-traditional partners such as academic institutions and those not normally associated with the forest industry. These entities are regarded as being important sources of research and development capacity; diversity is a key component of the innovation system. Through collaboration, the industry hopes to engage in new discussions about innovation, better understand their own value propositions, and identify achievable niches in emerging supply chains.

Under this second pillar, it also plans to develop engagement strategies to connect key forest sector innovation stakeholders, and create an open innovation platform through which external innovation providers may propose technology solutions to applied forest sector and bioeconomy technology issues.

The third and final pillar of the Kenora Declaration is mobilization. In it, the CCFM and its member jurisdictions aim to mobilize the talent and the technologies needed by forest sector producers. The council aims to facilitate stronger connections between academia, graduate students and forest product producers in part by collaborating with Mitacs, a Canadian not-for-profit research and training organization that promotes connections between industry, academics and government. The council also plans to continue to promote the large and vital role of Canada’s Indigenous Peoples in the forest sector – as employees, business owners, providers of ecosystem knowledge and community stakeholders.

Policy

Dossier Canada

All Canada’s

Resources

The bioeconomy can promote economic development, employment and climate and environmental benefits. Ottawa’s government has understood this potential very well creating an attractive and stimulating environment for the development of this sector. edited by Global Affairs Ministry Canada & Natural Resources Canada

It is well known that Canada is rich in biomass. Less known is the fact that the country also has a myriad of strongly developed industries that can leverage the potential of the bioeconomy.

In Canada, small and medium-sized companies and divisions of larger companies from various industries are actively undertaking the commercialization of bioproducts as well as research & development in the conversion of biomass into biofibres, biofuels, biomaterials and bioindustrial oils.

As part of its positioning towards a clean-tech, low carbon economy,

Canada is in the midst of developing and aligning policy tools and incentives to unleash such potential.

A Natural Advantage Canada knows that bioeconomy represents an outstanding opportunity to boost jobs and future economic growth for both rural and urban communities; rejuvenating existing industries or even creating new ones. Of course, the country still derives major economic advantage from extractive sectors. However, increasing convergence between mining, oil and gas industries and industrial biotech developers, combined with relentless

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renewablematter 12. 2016

1. Canadian Bioenergy Association, “Industry’s perspective on Bioeconomy”, 2013.

2. Bioproducts: Canada’s Competitive Advantages, Invest in Canada Bureau, Global Affairs Canada, 2012.

3. Idem.

4. Idem.

5. Canada – Strategic Location for Biorefinery Investment – Final Report, prepared for Global Affairs Canada.

2015 Suthey Holler Associates.

technology progresses and integration, results in greater process efficiency, as well as reduced carbon footprint and environmental impact.1 In Canada, there is a wide range of bio-based technologies being developed, using various platform technologies and there are many processes for which Canada is well renowned for its expertise (see box).

Canada offers a pragmatic approach to creating an attractive environment for bioproduct and biorefinery development that is ongoing and being continually adjusted. Biomass conversion is a strategic area of focus for Canada. Canada’s federal government works closely with its provincial, municipal and industry counterparts to support the development of this industry.

This support includes mechanisms, networks, and programs to support the financing, R&D, and development of commercial scale manufacturing facilities.2 In Canada, the bioproducts industry includes firms that produce biofuels, bio-based chemicals, plastics materials and specialty products using biological feedstocks and bioprocesses.

Canada’s bioproducts industry is at the front edge of a significant growth opportunity as traditional industries continue their shift to bio-based fuels, chemicals and materials at an accelerated pace.

Bioenergy

Iogen Corporation, www.iogen.ca Ensyn Technologies Inc., www.ensyn.com Greenfield Ethanol, www.greenfieldethanol.com

With its large reserves of agricultural and forestry resources and significant quantities of waste organic materials, Canada has more biomass resource per capita than any other nation.

The Canadian bioenergy industry is developing leading edge biofuel densification and conversion systems in liquid form (such as ethanol or renewable diesel fuels), gaseous (such as biogas or syngas) or solids (such as pellets or char). Innovative Canadian technologies are being advanced in the fields of combustion, pyrolysis, gasification, anaerobic digestion, landfill biogas utilization, fermentation and catalytic hydrotreatment of biomass oils. Canadian biofuel leaders include: Iogen Corporation, Ensyn Technologies Inc. and Greenfield Ethanol.3 Biomaterials

Stemergy, www.stemergy.com GreenCore Composites, www.greencorenfc.com

Canadian hemp, flax and other biomass crops are being converted for high value applications, such as textiles, plastic composites, insulation and paper. Residues from wheat straw and shives/hurds are being recycled into straw board, concrete reinforcing, filler for plastic composites and animal bedding. Canadian pioneers in this field include: Stemergy, an Ontario company that develops products for use in the building and auto sector; GreenCore Composites, a Toronto area based manufacturer of natural fibre reinforced composite materials for injection molding. There are also extruder

companies that produce products ranging from automotive parts to rigid containers, sports equipment and furniture.4 Biobased Chemicals and Bioindustrial Oils Industry is increasingly viewing bio-based chemicals and polymer production as being economically and environmentally attractive.

The biomass will provide the base materials of sucrose, starch, cellulose, hemicelluloses, lignin, oils and protein, which lead to chemicals and materials. For example, Greenfield Ethanol, generally recognized for ethanol production, also produces high quality alcohol for the liquor industry, creating increased value. BioAmber has developed a process for succinic acid, a bio-based chemical, and has a production facility in Sarnia, Ontario.

A Team Effort Canada has been at the forefront in undertaking landmark activities and initiatives for mapping how forest products and agriculture-based industries can rapidly transition to the bioeconomy,5 including: Industrial Bioproducts Value Chain Roundtable The Industrial Bioproducts Value Chain Committee is an industry forum centered on the agricultural sector and hosted by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC). It was established on the premise that bioproducts provide an opportunity to transform agricultural crops and non-food biomass (e.g. straw, flax and hemp stems, purpose-grown crops) into high-value products such as bio-based chemicals, biomaterials, biofuels, and bioenergy.

Bioproducts support innovation and enhance the competitiveness of Canadian farmers, help address environmental issues and reduce Canada’s overall greenhouse gas footprint, and create clean

Bio-based: Excellent Technologies •• •• •• •• •• •• •• •• •• •• •• •• •• ••

Anaerobic digestion Bio-based materials and composites Biomass gasification Catalytic hydro-treating of biomass oils Cellulosic ethanol Platform chemicals and intermediates Enhanced Fischer-Tropsch technology Feedstock supply logistics and monitoring Fermentation technologies Nanocrystalline cellulose Pelletization of Biochar production Plant genomics Pyrolysis technologies Waste to energy technologies

Canada by FreeVectorMaps.com

Policy

WHERE THE CLUSTERS OF BIOPRODUCTS ARE LOCATED

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3 2 1. WESTERN PROVINCES Edmonton and Drayton Valley Bio-Mile, Alberta | Saskatoon, Saskatchewan | Winnipeg, Manitoba | British Columbia Industry Leaders: Agrisoma Biosciences, Plains Industrial Hemp Processing, Himark BioGas, Metabolix, Nexterra Systems Corp., Novozymes, Linnaeus Plant Sciences, Prairie Plant Systems, S2G BioChemicals.

2. ONTARIO & QUEBEC Port Colbourne Valley, Ontario | SarniaLambton Biohybrid Chemistry Cluster, Ontario | Thetford Mines, Quebec | Guelph, Ontario | Thunder Bay, Ontario Industry Leaders: Airex Energy, BioAmber, BIOX Corp., CelluForce, EcoSynthetix, Enerkem, Ensyn Corporation, GreenCore Composites, GreenField Specialty Alcohols, LANXESS, Tembec, The Woodbridge Group.

jobs across the Canadian economy in research and development, agriculture, and value-added manufacturing.

Canadian Biomass Innovation Network The Canadian Biomass Innovation Network (CBIN) is a network of federal researchers, program managers, policy makers, and expert advisors partnered with industry, academia, nongovernmental organizations, other government levels and the international community. The Network’s goal is to continually ensure the availability of knowledge, technology and enabling policy required to support the development of a sustainable Canadian bioeconomy.6 Canadian Bioeconomy Network Major industry associations in Canada, which have a stake in bioeconomy, have created the Canadian Bioeconomy Network (BEN). The consortium is a broad based industry forum that represents

3. ATLANTIC PROVINCES Innovacorp Demonstration Centre, Brooklyn, Nova Scotia | Perennia Innovation Centre, Bible Hill, Nova Scotia Industry Leaders: ADI Systems, Atlantec Bioenergy Corp., Atlantic Council for Bioenergy Cooperative Limited, AV Cell, Canadian BioEnergy Centre, Cavendish Farms, Chatham Biotec, Ocean Nutrition Canada, Solarvest BioEnergy, Tekmash Group.

900 member companies, sustains over 2 million jobs nationally and generates over $300 billion in total annual revenue. BEN is working with the government of Canada in facilitating development of the bioeconomy across value chains in multiple sectors,7 such as the mining, petrochemicals, food and automotive industries.

Canada’s Way Forward on Climate Change The Government of Canada provides national leadership and joins with the provinces and territories to take action on climate change, put a price on carbon, and reduce carbon pollution.

The Government of Canada also commits to protecting Canada’s communities and grow the national economy by making significant new investments in green infrastructure and clean technologies, which include: •• A $2 billion Low Carbon Economy Trust to fund projects that reduce carbon;

6. www.nrcan.gc.ca/ energy/renewableelectricity/bioenergysystems/17160 7. www.fpac.ca/creatinga-canadian-advantage-inthe-bio-economy/

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renewablematter 12. 2016 •• G20 commitment and phasing out of subsidies for the fossil fuel industry; •• Working with the Provinces and Territories to develop a Canadian Energy Strategy to protect Canada’s energy security, encourage energy conservation, and bring cleaner renewable energy into the electricity grid.

9. See note 2.

Moreover, the Government of Canada is committed to working with international partners to reach an ambitious global agreement that is anchored in science and leads the world towards a lowcarbon, climate resilient economy. Canada is also committed to supporting the poorest and most vulnerable countries to adapt to the adverse effects of climate change, and is doing its part to mobilize critical investments that will achieve sustained emissions reductions in developing countries.8

10. Idem.

Canada’s Network of Bio-Industrial Clusters

8. www.climatechange. gc.ca/default. asp?lang=En&n= 72F16A84-1

Canada’s bio-based industry has strategically developed itself around specific regions to reduce cost in accessing biomass feedstocks and reap the economic benefits of clustering. In turn, this has encouraged and nurtured the development of leading biomass conversion technologies and strong knowledge-based bio-clusters across the country.

For instance, forestry clusters will develop around areas of pulp and paper (such as Drayton Valley, Alberta). Biobased chemical clusters will develop around areas where chemical manufacturing is already based and local biomass feedstock are available (such as Sarnia, Ontario).

Agricultural clusters will develop in central agriculture areas (such as Saskatoon, Saskatchewan).9 One of the world’s leading centres for bio-agriculture, Saskatoon is among the most dynamic and vibrant locations for innovation and commercialization of agricultural biotechnology and bio-based sciences.

The Saskatoon Cluster is located in the heart of Western Canadian Agriculture in Saskatchewan.

Hence, there is access to large volumes of straw from wheat and barley production and crop oils from canola (Brassica napus), camelina (Camelina sativa) and carromata (Brassica carinata).

The National Research Council’s Plant Biotechnology Institute in Saskatoon offers companies a full range of services, including access to laboratory space and leading-edge genomics equipment. Its partnership program incubates businesses during the critical early years of development, ensuring a firm foundation of technology and business expertise.10

Policy Tembec Bio-Products. A Successful Story Tembec is a major producer of specialty cellulose and co-products, lignosulfonates.

For this Montreal, Quebec headquartered company, global leadership began in working with the World Wildlife Fund to ensure well managed forests for years to come through implementation of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards.

FSC certification confirms the chain of custody of products while strengthening relationships with First Nations. Tembec’s bio-refineries produce specialty pulps for a wide variety of markets including pharmaceuticals, food and coatings while its lignin products can be used in construction and in generating bio-energy. Its cogeneration facilities in France and Canada consume bark and mill wastes to produce green energy sold to the grid and process thermal energy. The company also operates three anaerobic treatment plants where microorganisms convert organic pollutants in wastewater into bio-gas to replace natural gas in pulp driers. www.tembec.com

11. Idem.

12. www.genomecanada. ca/en/about-us/visionand-mission 13. www.agr.gc.ca/eng/ programs-and-services/ list-of-programs-andservices/agriinnovationprogram/?id= 1460123349608 14. www.nrcan. gc.ca/forests/federalprograms/13139 15. www.nrc-cnrc. gc.ca/eng/solutions/ collaborative/industrial_ bio_index.html 16. www.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/ eng/irap/about/index.html

developing and applying genomics and genomicbased technologies to create economic and social benefits for Canadians. The organization: •• connects ideas and people across public and private sectors to find new uses for genomics; •• invests in large-scale science and technology to fuel innovation; •• translates discoveries into solutions across key sectors of national importance, including health, agriculture and agri-food, forestry, fisheries and aquaculture, the environment, energy and mining.

Genome Canada not only advances genomics science and technology; it also transforms knowledge of the ethical, environmental, economic, legal and social challenges and opportunities into sound policies and practices that enhance the impact of genomics.12 AgriInnovation Program. Led by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, this program makes two types of early-stage corporate investments: those targeted at research and development activities that bring innovation to the sector; and those that help industry bring the results of research and development to market through adoption/ commercialization by receptor industries.13 Investment in Forest Industry Transformation Program. This program is managed by Natural Resources Canada and support Canada’s forest sector in becoming more economically competitive and environmentally sustainable. It supports the forest industry’s transformation by accelerating the deployment of highly innovative, first-in-kind technologies at Canadian forest industry facilities.

These projects include bioenergy, biomaterials, biochemicals, etc.14

Bioeconomy In Canada: Driven by Innovation Canada fosters a vibrant R&D environment that promotes public-private-university collaborative research in industrial biotechnologies, bioprocesses and bioproducts. Funded by governments at the federal and provincial levels, researchers in Canada’s network of universities and specialized research institutions are conducting leading-edge research that entrepreneurs and corporations of all sizes, foreign and Canadian, can leverage to meet their business development objectives. Provided below are some of the key federal programs. Canadian provinces and territories are also offering a myriad of innovation and deployment programs and incentives.11 Genome Canada. Genome Canada is a not-forprofit organization which acts as a catalyst for

Industrial Biomaterials Program. National Research Council Canada’s Industrial Biomaterials flagship program fosters commercial success and tangible impacts of bio-sourced industrial materials and advanced composites manufacturing. IB program develops cost-effective and next-generation polymer resins, fibers, reinforcements and composites from non-food renewable and recyclable resources.15 Industrial Research Assistance Program.

The Industrial Research Assistance Program (IRAP) is another program led by the The National Research Council of Canada. It helps small and medium-sized enterprises in Canada build their capability in technology and innovation.

The program offers direct technical assistance, access to the latest technological advances, expertise, facilities, and resources, as well as costshared financing of innovative technical projects.16 Export Development Canada (EDC) and Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) also provide flexible financing programs and solutions tailored to support companies in their commercialization efforts globally.

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renewablematter 12. 2016

Sugar is Better

THAN OIL

The newly opened industrial plant in Bottrighe will produce 30,000 tonnes of bio-butanediol a year. It will be produced without using a single drop of oil, thanks to a bacterium which will operate as a totally organic and renewable nano-refinery.

This represents a new world record for Italian green chemistry.

by Emanuele Bompan

C4H10O2. This is the formula of 1,4-Butanediol, a chemical compound derived from butane, a colourless gas which is obtained through fractional distillation of oil and natural gas.

It is a fossil-derived liquid, widely used as a solvent and for the production of plastics, elastic fibres – such as spandex – and polyurethan. It is also used in the pharmaceutical industry, as well as a recreational drug, under the name of “One Comma Four,” which is the chemical bond between oxygen and hydrogen.

Most importantly, butanediol is a real treasure for industry.

Currently, the total value of the global industrial market for 1,4-Bdo – as it is called in the sector – is estimated at around €3.5 million.

The main producers of Bdo from fossil fuels are the big world chemical groups: from German Basf to Dairen in Taiwan, down to American Lyondell, Isp and DuPont. Hundreds of thousands of tonnes of oil are used every year to produce it; quite a considerable amount for a chemical product.

For this reason, alternative formulae have been researched for years, which could synthetize Bdo from non-fossil sources.

Big chemical companies, such as the multinational Basf, have tried in vain to use alternative processes, without being able to reach industrial scale production.

However, non-fossil 1,4-Butanediol is about to enter the market. On 30th September 2016, Novamont, a pioneer and world leader in the development of bioplastics and bioproducts, opened the first industrial plant ever

Case Studies which will produce bio-butanediol, through its subsidiary Mater-Biotech. The plant is in Bottrighe, in the Adria industrial area, in the province of Rovigo. The bio-butanediol will be produced without a single drop of oil, allowing for a saving of over 50% on CO2 emissions. This represents a new record in Italian green chemistry, which is proving incredibly active.

But what is replacing oil? “Novamont has started producing 1,4-Bdo directly from sugar, using a technology developed by Genomatica – a leader in bioengineering innovation – which was integrated by our chemical know-how,” explains Luigi Capuzzi, head of research at Novamont.

The base of this revolution is a kind of escherichia-coli (e.ßcoli), a small common bacterium that lives in the intestine of warmblooded animals. It is an abundant resource: every day we expel from the last tract of our intestine up to 100 billion bacteria.

The only bacterium capable of synthetising sugar into butanediol in one single step through its digestion was selected out of the thousand types that were synthetically produced and tested in laboratories. It is the only one that can operate the same way as a completely organic and renewable nano-refinery.

The process was discovered in 2008 in San Diego, California, by the synthetic biologist Christophe Schilling, CEO and founder of Genomatica, who is described by Scientific American as one the most brilliant minds in the sector. “We have genetically engineered an organism that needs secreting this kind of product in order to grow” Shilling said in a recent interview. “ The interest of e.coli is in line with our interest. The more it produces, the more it grows.”

Schilling’s company has worked for years to genetically engineer an e.coli capable

Indeed there are other processes that transform butanediol from renewable sources, but they are not equally efficient per cost unit.

of developing a digestive system that could synthetize sugar at temperatures around 40 °C. “In nature, no bacteria can do it spontaneously.

Genomatica is the only company that discovered this,” explains Luigi Capuzzi, head of research at Novamont. “And we are the only ones who have used it on a large scale, making biobutanediol competitive, even in spite of the current low oil price.”

The strategic advantage of Novamont lies in the direct procedure of transformation.

Indeed there are other processes that transform butanediol from renewable sources, but they are not equally efficient per cost unit.

“At the moment it is already possible to transform sugar into succinic acid using bacteria,” Capuzzi specifies.

“At a later stage, this acid is transformed into 1,4-Bdo through chemical hydrogenation.

But the competitive and environmental advantage of our product, compared to other non-fossil Bdo, lies in our one-step process,” with significant savings in terms of costs, energy and emissions.

All-Round Sustainability The sustainability of the “made in Novamont” bio-butanediol is not exclusively related to the product, which certainly reduces the use of oil, but also to the process. The Bottrighe plant, where bio-butanediol is produced, is truly excellent and a great example of Italian green chemistry.

The Mater-Biotech bio-technological plant has been designed in a way that it can re-use the process’ byproducts for its own energy needs, thus optimizing the life cycle of the entire productive flow. It was created in less than four years replacing an old plant that had closed in 2006 and that used to produce lysine (a polar amino acid which is used as a food supplement). The plant will be able to

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renewablematter 12. 2016 produce 30,000 tonnes of butanediol per year, providing employment – at full capacity – to 70 people, and creating a spin-off of about 180-200 workers. “We acquired the structure, completely regenerating the fermentation part, which was in good conditions, but we had to build the downstream part from scratch, as lysine is a solid product, an aminoacid that purifies through crystallization.

1,4-Bdo is a liquid product which purifies through distillation and for this reason it required an ad-hoc plant. What really makes us proud is the fact that we could give a new start to both the plant and the workers,” Capuzzi explains.

The plant, which is quite small compared to other refineries of fossil fuel-derived Bdo, is part of the Novamont integrated biorefinery

project. This is currently made up of six interconnected sites and four new technologies: the bio-Bdo, the system of starch complex formation, the process for biodegradable polyesters and finally the acid production system (azelaic acid and natural oil-derived pelargonic acid).

The research managers show their satisfaction and their pride at having built such a plant in Italy in record time. “We put together the idea of growing the e.coli bacteria and our capacity to move our research projects to an industrial scale,” Capuzzi explains, “combining the selected microorganisms, the engineered fermentation process, and the downstream part, so as to obtain an extremely pure product, which is in all aspects similar to the one derived from fossil sources.”

RA

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How our butanadiol is produced

MA

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MICROORGANISMS INACTIVATION (pastorization)

ORGANIS

ENERGY/STEAM FILTRATION

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PURIFICATION EVAPORATION

SPENT CELLS

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DOWNSTREAM

Info www.novamont.com

Novamont research is working towards the use of sugar derived from ligno-cellulosic biomass, coming from crops on marginal terrains that are not used for agriculture.

A Circular Production How to make the production process of 1,4-Bdo even greener and more circular? At the moment, the production of butanediol uses “digestion” of a glucose syrup produced by Cargill.

“To produce a kilo of butanediol we need two kilos of sugar according to the process’ stoichiometry,” Capuzzi explains.

The problem is that sugar comes from food crops. For this reason, Novamont research is working towards the use of sugar derived from ligno-cellulosic biomass, coming from crops on marginal terrains that are not used for agriculture.

As of today, the most advanced crop at an experimental level is thistle, which also has the benefit of being a double dividend product. One the one hand, an oil obtained from thistle seeds can be used by Novamont in its Porto Torres plant, in the process that transform it into azelaic acid (C9H16O4, the acid component in the polyesters that are used in the mater-Bi®, while the alcoholic component is butanediol itself). On the other hand,

the thistle stem can be used as ligno-cellulosic mass for Bdo. These two elements together are the base of Novamont bioplastics. “We hope to use our 1,4-Bdo in our bioplastics, so as to obtain products with high-environmental performances in a restricted production cycle, in full respect of the rules of bioeconomy,” Capuzzi concludes.

Novamont’s interest in investing in thistle crops is hardly surprising, as it proves fundamental in obtaining second generation sugars, azelaic acid, as well as a series of proteins for animal feeding.

This way the bio-integral cycle of the product is completed. A product which is derived from a crop growing on non irrigated terrains unfit for agriculture, and which is realized in a plant that can use and recover outputs though a synthetic bacterium. All this happens without using a single drop of oil.

The future of chemistry (be it Italian or not) is green and circular.

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The Unburnable

CARBON BUBBLE Interview with Mark Campanale edited by Diego Tavazzi

Unep Inquiry, web.unep.org/inquiry

Rapporto Unburnable Carbon – Are the world’s financial markets carrying a carbon bubble?, tinyurl.com/na7xywd

Mark Campanale is an investment professional working in sustainable finance since 1989, in investment management and corporate finance.

His two major independent projects, the Social Stock Exchange, www.socialstockexchange.com and more recently, the Carbon Tracker Initiative which he founded in 2010, both attempted to address important problem gaps in which capital markets function.

Mark conceived, with his co-founder Nick Robins who is currently Co-director of UNEP Inquiry, the “unburnable carbon” and “carbon bubble” idea. Since its launch, the concept has spread globally and is now commonly used by investors, analysts, media and more recently by financial regulators including the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney.

This ground-breaking theory was the result of a long journey that Mark undertook from starting in sustainable finance in the late 1980’s, when he had a chance to develop some innovative ideas around how to restructure capital markets.

What is Carbon Tracker? Who founded it and what are its objectives?

“The Carbon Tracker Initiative is a non-profit financial think tank of former City energy analysts, expert systems thinkers

and communicators aimed at bridging the divide between the capital markets and climate change.

“It’s been almost a decade since I identified that there was more carbon dioxide being financed across the world than could be burned to safely prevent dangerous climate change: in other words, a carbon bubble.

“With seed grants from Growald Family Fund, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and Tellus Mater Foundation, we had the necessary resources to put real time into this thesis. Bringing James Leaton, our current Research Director, on board to provide the analysis and Jeremy Leggett to steer the Board, Carbon Tracker emerged as a new voice highlighting the financial risk of climate change.”

When did you conceive the “carbon bubble”?

“In 2011 Carbon Tracker published its first report: ‘Unburnable Carbon - Are the world’s financial markets carrying a carbon bubble?’.

It was with this piece of ground-breaking analysis that we showed that there was five times more CO2 locked away in the proven reserves of fossil fuel companies than could be burned to safely keep anthropogenic global warming below two-degrees Celsius.

“This paper gained widespread attention,

Case Studies most notably of environmentalist Bill McKibben’s, whose Rolling Stone article, referencing this simple math, is one of the most-online-read pieces on climate change.

“Our financial analysis demostrates that most of the fossil fuels have to stay in the ground because the sector could become unprofitable through a rapid energy transition. By making investors aware of climate action risks to financial markets, Carbon Tracker is accelerating the swift allocation of capital towards a renewable energy future.”

Bill McKibben, “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math”, Rolling Stone 19 luglio 2012; tinyurl.com/8yvcdvy

Mark Campanale, Founder and Executive Director Carbon Tracker Initiative.

Since the publication of the reports Unburnable Carbon 2011 and 2013, the notions “unburnable carbon,” “carbon bubble” and “stranded assets” have entered the mainstream finance and political language. Can you explain what they are about?

“You start with the maximum amount of carbon dioxide that can be put in the atmosphere while still having a reasonable chance to keep global warming below 2 °C. This is our ‘carbon budget’. If you compare this with the carbon emissions embedded in fossil fuel reserves and resources, it becomes clear that only about a third of them can be burned – this is the carbon bubble. The other two thirds need to be left in the ground – not to mention investments wasted searching for more fossil fuels in places like the Arctic or the ultra-deep sea. For clarity, we never said this is a financial bubble, but there are important financial implications. As Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England, put it, if investors suddenly decide to reassess the viability of the fossil fuel sector, this ‘could potentially destabilize markets.’ This is why it is important that the world embark on an orderly transition to low carbon, which avoids financial dislocation and value destruction.

“By introducing terms such as ‘stranded assets’ and ‘unburnable carbon’, Carbon Tracker created a new financial lexicon, with the Wall Street Journal declaring that ‘the concept of the carbon bubble has gone mainstream.’

“The idea of the carbon bubble warns that investors risk being left with ‘stranded assets’ – investments in fossil fuels that are rendered unprofitable by global technological advances, tougher climate regulation and the switch to renewables.

“In 2013 we found that between 60-80% of coal, oil and gas reserves of publicly listed companies are ‘unburnable’ if the world

is to have a chance of not exceeding global warming of 2 °C. “Since then we have been developing a financial model which investigates the implications of lower hydrocarbons’ demand, price and emissions scenarios for the capital expenditure plans of the fossil fuel industry.

“We argue that in order to prepare the ground for the low-carbon transition underway capital markets need to correctly price climate risk and the ‘true’ costs of investing in fossil fuels.”

Investors, policy-makers, energy sector, grassroot movements: what are the risks that they face and what the recommendations you give them?

“First, physical risk: in order to avoid the most dangerous impacts of climate change, scientists have shown that we must limit global warming to 2 ˚C, a target now adopted unanimously by governments through the landmark Paris Agreement on climate. Yet we know that if we were to burn all known fossil fuel reserves and resources, we would go way beyond this 2 ˚C target, ushering in potentially irreversible damages from extreme weather events and rising sea levels.

“This translates immediately into one type of financial risk: as described by the chairman of the Axa insurance company, ‘a world of 4 ˚C is uninsurable.’ Equally important – but not as obvious – are the financial risks that Carbon Tracker has brought to the attention of markets. If up to two thirds of fossil fuels cannot be burned, investors in these projects risk being left with up to $2 trillion in ‘stranded assets,’ investments rendered valueless by a combination of rapid technological progress from renewables, more stringent climate policies and shifts in market sentiment. This is why it is important to shift capital away from high-cost, high-carbon projects into the increasingly profitable green economy.”

After the Paris Agreement, what are the prospects for the financial markets investing in fossil fuels? What are the risks at stake? Can we quantify them?

“One of the latest Carbon Tracker’s analyses (‘Lost in Transition,’ ‘Danger Zone’) show that a business as usual model could put over $2 trillion of oil, coal and gas capital expenditure on high-cost projects at risk of becoming financially stranded to 2025.

“Turning to opportunities, ‘Sense & Sensitivity,’ a report we put out this year found that oil majors would be worth up to $140 billion more if they aligned their production with a 2 ˚C target.

So we are keeping an eye on both sides of the risk-reward equation.

“We will also be launching a major piece of research in collaboration with the Grantham Institute at Imperial College London, looking at

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renewablematter 12. 2016 the disruptive potential of clean technologies.

We want to find out how the future energy mix would look like when faced with rapidly falling costs of solar PV or electric vehicles and the decoupling of energy demand from economic growth. From Apple to Tesla, there is abundant evidence that massive changes can occur quicker than expected, so this is definitely a piece of research of interest to forward-looking investors.”

Report Energy Access: why coal is not the way out of energy poverty, www.carbontracker.org/ report/energyaccess/

Info www.carbontracker.org www.socialstock exchange.com

Which financial players appeared to be more responsive to your messages?

Where instead did you find more obstacles?

“Several major financial and political institutions have integrated Carbon Tracker’s analysis to make financial decisions through the investment chain.

“For example, HSBC and Citigroup borrowed from Carbon Tracker’s arguments to advise investors to manage the increasing stranded asset risk associated with fossil fuel assets.

Based on the same arguments, the insurance company Axa recently sold off $500 million of coal assets.

“The divestment movement, also inspired by the ‘carbon bubble’ idea, has spread worldwide at unprecedented speed. In December 2015 over 500 institutions worth $3.4 trillion had committed to divest from fossil fuels. This movement is growing fast and we are now waiting for the group Divest-Invest to announce the 2016 number.

“Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England recently declared that ‘of all the recent ideas campaigners have come up with to convince the world to do more to curb global warming, none has been as potent as the concept of stranded fossil fuel assets’.

“North Europe institutional investment funds stand out as the most responsive ones to these themes. For example the Norwegian Pension Fun, the fund manager Storebrand, and the Swedish AP4 and AP2 took clear actions to integrate climate risk and decarbonize their portfolios.

“In the US two of the majors pension funds – CalPERS (the California Public Employees’ Retirement System) and CalSTRS (the California State Teachers’ Retirement System) – are engaging with us and with the climate community to align their investment patterns to a 2 ˚C strategy.”

What was the reaction of the fossil fuel industry after the publication of “Unburnable Carbon?”

“Carbon Tracker is challenging the assumptions of the incumbent energy sector. As a result of an intense research and engagement activity, big fossil fuel corporations like Royal Dutch Shell and ExxonMobil are now openly debating how climate change can impact the global financial system.

“In 2014 we experience some significant resistance to our narrative from the industry.

Both Exxon and Shell publicly dismissed the carbon bubble risk, as they sought to assure investors of their business model risk management.

“In response to this, we published two technical papers (‘Response to Exxon,’ ‘Response to Shell’), which clarified our assumptions in a series of counter-arguments. In a nutshell, while welcoming the public engagement of the industry with these issues, we argued that their approach were based on underestimating potentially weaker demand for oil due to tougher climate policies, technological advances and slower economic growth. These laid important foundations for future engagement with companies, an increasingly important focus through 2016.

Further anticipating industry pushback, our report ‘Energy Access: why coal is not the way out of energy poverty,’ provided a reality-check to the notion that coal is ‘essential to meet the scale of Africa’s desperate need for electricity,’ heavily backed by coal giant Peabody Energy Corp. Only a few months later we documented the collapse of the US coal industry, a fate that continues to spread to other coal markets.”

Why does Carbon Tracker insist so much on climate disclosures and transparency?

“During the last year governments and international bodies have begun to seriously consider the financial implications of climate change and continued fossil fuel investment. Carbon Tracker’s regulatory research and engagement work is concentrated on convincing financial regulators of the need to improve the consideration of the climate risk for financial markets.

“The direction of travel towards a lower-carbon economy is clear; stress-testing extractives companies’ businesses portfolios against the internationally agreed two-degree climate target is essential to quantifying their exposure. Addressing current disclosure gaps will allow users of financial disclosures to better assess how companies consider and manage climate-related risks. Investors no longer want to see regulatory filings from fossil fuel companies that fail to discuss how the low carbon transition might impact their business models.

“For this reason, we very much welcome the Financial Stability Board Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures chaired

by Michael Bloomberg. It represents a fundamental effort to create a set of standardized and consistent set of required climate disclosures from companies materially affected by climate change and related policies, regulations, energy transition and physical impacts.”

©Claudio Divizia/Shutterstock

Case Studies

From Waste to Green

Building

This is the story of a company – the only one in Europe – that created a whole supply chain starting from residues of incinerators, generating a new product: a renewable and circular matter.

by Rudi Bressa

Europe is asking us to prohibit – by 2025 – the use of landfills for plastic, metal, glass, paper and cardboard recyclable residues and for biodegradable ones; it is also calling for an almost total ban of landfills by 2030. This forces us to rethink the whole supply chain, increasing our sense of responsibility.

The Concept of End of Waste It is exactly in this framework that the concept of end of waste develops. This concept implies that a material or an object ceases to be considered a residue and it gets used for other purposes, generating its own market and demand, without producing any negative impacts on human health and the environment (art. 184-ter, Dlgs 152/06).

Following this principle, exactly 15 years ago Officina dell’Ambiente decided to create a new and innovative supply chain, and for this reason it is still considered a pioneer in Europe. Starting from waste which is generated in incinerators, the company produces a series of sands and granular materials – the Matrix Family – which find innumerable applications in the building industry: bricks, cement clinker, ready-mix concrete, premeasured cement, asphalt concrete.

The process followed by Officina dell’Ambiente allows for the reuse of 99.6% of incoming refuse, creating a stable and repetitive mineral product which closes the cycle. The Matrix Inside products that they produce for the building industry are totally sustainable, as Officina dell’Ambiente has studied and assigned them the correct usage

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Rudi Bressa is a freelance journalist and naturalist, who writes about the environment, science, renewable energy and circular economy for various national newspapers.

percentage through the Dop (Declaration of Performance) procedure. This represents, on the one hand, a new step in the recovery cycle of materials, avoiding extraction and the use of mineral raw materials; on the other, it allows for a circular supply chain that ends when the product is being reused and which generates wholly recyclable materials.

From Waste to New Matter Officina dell’Ambiente has two processing plants: one in Lomella, in the province of Pavia, and the other in Conselice, near Ravenna, with a total treating capacity of 500,000 tonnes of refuse per year.

These plants do not treat industrial waste produced by incinerators, or that coming from

intermediate stocking sites or any mixing, but only the residues coming from the incineration of urban solid waste from parts of North and Central Italy, which cannot be differentiated or recycled any further.

Over the years, this self-regulation has allowed the company to maintain the intrinsic quality of the final product, both at a technical and an environmental level.

The refuse is a material which is made up mainly of two fractions: one part has a chemical composition similar to that of a mineral material, while the other part is of a metallic nature (mainly iron and aluminium).

Before being processed, the refuse needs to be stocked for about 40 days, during which time it goes through a natural chemical process defined as litho-stabilization.

Inside the storage loads, the temperature

Case Studies averages 70 degrees centigrade. The aluminium oxidizes, carbon dioxide produces carbonation and new mineralogical phases take place.

At this point, the metal component, which is still valuable, is separated through a series of conveyor belts, hoppers and iron removers.

At the exit point, urban mining sites of iron and aluminium are therefore created. Out of this fraction, the non-usable part is then extracted, that 0.4% which will go back to the incinerators.

At this point, the mineral material gets further refined and at the end of the process it looks like a granular matter of different sizes: one part is comprised between 0 and 10 mm, another one between 2 and 10 mm, and finally there is a sand with a granular size of 0-2 mm, 0-4 mm and 2-4 mm.

Tracking Process and Certifications Through the years, Officina dell’Ambiente has provided its plants with Emas registration and its products with CE marking. This work continues beyond the factory walls, as they follow carefully

Concrete applications Porta Nuova Garibaldi Cerification: LEED v2.0 Core&Shell Gold Used Products: Blocks in CLS, lightweight screed Porta Nuova Varesine Cerification: LEED v2.0 Core&Shell Gold Used Products: Lightweight screed Porta Nuova Isola Cerification: LEED v2.2 NC Gold, LEED v2.0 Core&Shell Gold Used Products: Cement conglomerate for works of non reinforced (concrete) foundations and mass concrete

their clients in the realization of the Matrix Inside final products. To complete this process, they have also obtained voluntary environmental certifications. In 2013, they obtained EPD (Environmental Product Declaration), a statement of environmental performance, which provides verified and comparable information on the environmental impact of products and services. The EPD is released by the Swedish Environmental Management Council, following an evaluation of the products’ life cycle assessment, from their arrival at the plant to their final dispatch. Thanks to this certification, the Matrix Family products are eligible to obtain the LEED Certification (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design).

All the products from Officina dell’Ambiente also comply with the criteria of the Green Public Procurement in the building sector, i.e. those minimum environmental criteria for new construction, restructuring and maintenance of buildings, which aim to reduce the environmental impact on natural resources and increase the use of recycled materials.

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renewablematter 12. 2016 Interview

edited by R. B.

Aiming at the Quality of Recycled Products Alessandro Massalin, Commercial Director at Officina dell’Ambiente

The idea dates back 15 years, when there was still little talk of the circular economy. It was something of a precursor to matter recovery and the end of waste strategy.

Officina dell’Ambiente is internationally renowned for its Matrix products and, as of today, you are the only ones who can produce an EPD artificial aggregate in the whole of Europe. How did you achieve this result?

“What we are striving towards is the quality of the recycled product and the recovery of matter.

We have always done that. In 15 years we have never brought any material to landfills. We recycle 100% of all that is recyclable.”

Info www.matrixoda.it

For this reason when you talk about the circular economy you also talk about the quality of the recycled product. What is your idea of the circular economy?

“The circular economy, in order to function, should rely on awareness of the use, which the whole of the supply chain, including municipal companies and designers, should have. They should demand that the manufactured product has some specific technical characteristics. The circular economy should be supported by a sort of intelligentsia who increases the level of compliance in order to close the cycle properly. However, we often hear about recycling in quantitative terms, but very little in terms of qualitative terms. When you pay attention to both the technical performance of the product and its environmental one, the solution to

the problem is not shifted to the future anymore, but it is solved at the base. However, in the case of many municipal companies, tenders for waste are still oriented towards the ‘how much,’ which generates a race to the bottom. In other words, they are still thinking in terms of the old linear economy, while the directives of the European Community go in the opposite direction.”

There are some obstacles, though.

“Moving from a linear economy to a circular one is costly. According to us, who have been involved in the building sector for years, the only way to be really part of the circular economy is to think in qualitative terms. That is why we talk about ‘ethical industrial application.’ We have to give our products an awareness of use. Our products are accompanied by a DOP (Declaration of Performance): in this way, we specify the maximum usage percentage, further certifying the circularity of our product.”

That is why you have chosen the monomaterial, only solid urban waste. Did this not restrict your scope?

“Certainly. But when we chose to work in the circular economy, we understood that, in order to guarantee the long-term quality of recycling, it was imperative to work with only one type of waste. A waste that is stable, repetitive and homogeneous.

We decided that in order to have a high-level quality product and to guarantee the truthfulness of our certifications, this was the road to follow.”

Interview

edited by R. B.

A Supply Chain that Allows for the Recovery of Matter Filippo Brandolini, President of Herambiente Spa

On the one hand, Gruppo Hera operates at the end of the waste cycle, as an integral part of the collection system. On the other, it is the main actor in the supply chain created by Officina dell’Ambiente, being one of its main providers of waste.

Herambiente and Officina dell’Ambiente have collaborated for a long time in what is a perfect example of circular economy. Residues from

the incinerating process find a new use, turning into new matter. How did this collaboration start?

“Up until a few years ago, waste was mainly sent to landfills. Today, there are other destinations.

Over the years, our group has experienced the possibility of sending waste to a process of matter recovery, overcoming the landfill problem.

We therefore chose a company with innovative processes like Officina dell’Ambiente, which

Case Studies applies transparent procedures and has rigorous environmental certifications. This choice was also dictated by our need to make sure that the waste we provided was treated in full respect of the rules.”

Info ha.gruppohera.it

What is the added value of the supply chain you have created?

“We provide Officina dell’Ambiente with 130-170,000 tonnes per year, about half of the waste produced in our plants. The contract with Officina dell’Ambiente strikes a balance both at an environmental and economic level, thanks to the traceability and the certification of the product which Officina dell’Ambiente is able to guarantee. The second aspect worth stressing is that this supply chain manages to achieve recycling and recovery of matter. I am referring to iron and non-iron materials, in addition to the

recovery of the mineral part of waste as an aggregate in the cement industry. According to literature, iron metals account for between 7 and 15% of waste, while non-iron ones account for between 1 and 2%. We are talking about significant quantities in terms of rational use of resources, which also have an important economic value.”

European directives aim at a progressive reduction of waste sent to landfills by 2030.

Is this objective desirable?

“As a group we are convinced that it is possible to reach this target, which means reducing products sent to landfills below 10%. In 2015 we already achieved this result for urban waste. We also know, however, that the total elimination of landfills will not be possible, as there will continue to be non recyclable and non energy-valuable waste.”

Interview

edited by R. B.

Fewer Raw Materials, Less Waste in Landfills Daniele Gizzi, Environmental Manager, Aitec

The cement industry is the last tile of the mosaic.

This sector, which in 2015 produced about 19 million tonnes of cement, uses part of what is classified by law as non-dangerous waste and part of the matter that is not classified as waste, as a substitute to raw materials (clay, limestone and gypsum). The Italian technical-economic association of cement (Aitec), on behalf of the Italian cement producing companies, monitors and provides all the figures on the cement cycle.

Info www.aitecweb.com

The cement industry is the last link in the chain of non-dangerous waste recovery.

How does the use of this material impact on the sector?

“As Aitec we have been monitoring the quantity of waste that has been used to recover matter and energy since 2002. The use of alternative materials allows us to save raw materials such as limestone, clay and gypsum (the latter in particular, as it is quite scarce in Italy). This allows us to reduce extractive activity and its impact on the territory.

If we look at the matter according to an LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) framework, we realize that this is beneficial for the environment, as we save natural resources, as well as for the industry, as extractive costs are reduced. Finally, there is a reduction in waste to be disposed of: all these materials, if not recovered, would end up in landfills.”

How does our country rank, at the European level, for energy recovery and matter recovery?

“Italy still lags behind in terms of rate of calorie substitution, i.e. the use of waste as fuel: in 2015 we registered a value of 14.9%, while Europe registers 36% on average. If we take the example of cement factories in Germany (62%) and Austria (60%), the gap increases greatly.

These are cement factories that also use alternative fuel derived from Italian waste. If we consider instead the recovery of matter, we are totally in line with the rest of Europe. Even more, we are a virtuous country, in particular in the use of ashes derived by coal combustion and incineration.”

What is then the added value of using waste in the production of cement?

“Cement producers are very attentive to the chemical-physical composition of all the materials that enter the ovens, including waste. The fact that the Matrix material has all the environmental certifications and has had them for years, provides us with all the necessary guarantees. This way we save raw materials while optimizing the costs of the industrial process.”

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OIL

Draws a Perfect Circle

by Marco Moro

E. Bompan, “We Recyle Oil”, Renewable Matter, 6-7; www.renewablematter.eu/ art/149/We_Recycle_Oil

Italy has achieved excellent results in the management of used mineral oils. This case shows the importance of a product’s environmental certification in promoting environmental awareness through the whole supply chain.

The regeneration of used mineral oils represents a well-established positive example of circular economy in our country.

Today, in Italy over 95% of used lubricating oils which enter a regeneration plant is recovered. This amount of matter is reinserted into the market so as to create an almost perfect circularity, which has been going on for 50 years.

It all starts with a well-organized collection system, widely spread over the territory and implemented by the Compulsory Consortium of Used Oils (COOU), which has achieved excellent results in the last few years.

It is a system that – thanks to the technological excellence displayed by industrial actors working in the regeneration process – allows for

the reinsertion of a high quality product into the market, while at the same time avoiding dispersal in the environment of huge quantities of dangerous waste, such as used oils. This is an example of circularity which is then completed by a certification that allows the product to be inserted into the market of green public procurement, making the whole supply chain green.

But let’s analyze the most recent developments.

GPP (Green Public Procurement) – which has been made compulsory in Italy by the Public Procurement Code – allows for a big presence on the market of environmentally sustainable and regenerated products, which have similar or even higher performances compared to “virgin” products. These products

Case Studies represent environmental best practices, a result of the most advanced technologies, capable of generating a potentially huge positive impact on the environment.

In the case of regenerated lubricants, the excellence achieved in their technological development – like the one displayed

by Viscolube – allows for a product with the same quality as the virgin one to be available on the market; in addition to this, it is a green product.

“But the most rewarding aspect – explains Lanfranco Locandro, commercial director of Viscolube, leading company in the re-refinery of used lubricants – is that the qualitative level achieved in the regeneration process becomes the qualifying factor of the whole supply chain.

The final product – in this case the regenerated base which is then bought by lubricants’ producers – is traceable through a product certification that characterizes the whole productive cycle. This means that the whole regenerated base included in the final product and the fluxes of matter during the whole process are assessed, thus providing the necessary guarantee to the public buyer and an example for the final consumer.” This guarantee is provided by the environmental label.

The Push by the Public Sector In this context, GPP provides the necessary push towards environmental innovation through CAM – the minimum environmental criteria established by the Ministry of Environment – which define the technical characteristics for each class of product (and service) so that they qualify as green. This way public administrations can comply with the obligation provided for in the Public Procurement Code.

A concrete example is the “Transport CAM”.

This is a 2008 decree by the Ministry of Environment, which public administrations need to comply with for each tender where buying, leasing or renting of public transport is required. It requires, for the maintenance of vehicles, the use of engine lubricants with low viscosity, regenerated lubricants or those that comply with the ecological criteria of Ecolabel.

Another example is the “Building Sector CAM”.

This 2015 decree states that building sites’ vehicles and machineries can only use oils containing a quota of regenerated lubricating base with minimum thresholds varying from 15 to 50%, depending on the type of oil.

“In this scenario – Locandro continues – Viscolube’s commitment and the investments carried out towards the environmental innovation of the sector and the whole supply chain,

Product environmental certification: Remade in Italy Remade in Italy is an independent product environmental certification that assesses the recycled material of a final or semimanufactured product. It certifies the traceability of the production process in the various phases of the supply chain, starting from the analysis of the incoming raw material, down to the certified finite product.

The certification contains some provisions to guarantee maximum security in the use of the certified product. It is recognized by the laws that discipline GPP in Italy and can be released only by a third independent body, which needs to be accredited with the scheme.

Viscolube regenerated bases have been assessed by competent and qualified auditors during their whole production cycle: from the origin of the used lubricants to the processing inside the plant. Here, thanks to a patented process of bio-refinery – one of the most commonly used in the world – a wide variety of used oils are treated, producing re-refined bases, both Group I and Group II, which are used by the world’s most important lubricant companies. This process is made up of three parts: Preflash, Tda (or thermal deasphalting) and Hydrofinishing, one of the best technical and environmental solutions

for the production of high quality regenerated bases. Furthermore, a detailed traceability plan has been elaborated to show all the monitored steps.

As a result of the certification process, a label has been released for each regenerated base, containing the percentage of regenerated material (in Viscolube bases this amounts to 100%), together with the assignment of specific classes. The label shows the environmental effort in the traceability of the regenerated matter, which also leads to a significant positive impact on the entire cycle: compared to primary production, a huge saving is obtained in climate changing emissions and electricity.

These results need to be transferred to the final buyers, to create an effective “supply chain qualification.”

Following the assessment, the certification that accompanies the product – being accredited and thus having the highest level of reliability – can be used by contracting authorities as evidence of conformity to the environmental criteria contained in the CAM, which require or assign premiums to the use of regenerated lubricants in mechanical transports and machinery.

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renewablematter 12. 2016 find important confirmation. The technology designed by the company allows for the treatment of a volatile quality raw material, that generates products with higher quality compared to those that go through their first refinery process (also thanks to the effect of the synthetic components that are present in the recovered used lubricants). But Viscolube decided to go beyond the achievement of the technological excellence that has always characterized it.

It took a fundamental step towards promoting environmental awareness along the whole of the supply chain, carrying out a certification process of its products’ environmental quality.

This quality is also guaranteed by the work of a widespread, selective and perfectly traceable collection, which is implemented by COOU. Good collection allows for good regeneration.”

Info www.viscolube.it

Target: The End Consumer “If the public component seems to ‘have done its bit’ by acknowledging the role of the re-refined lubricating product, Viscolube – Locandro stresses – still has a key objective to achieve: the awareness of the final consumer.

The first step is to raise awareness in the whole of the supply chain, thus adequately valuing not only the collection activity, but also the environmental aspect and the quality of the regeneration technology and the product that is derived from it.” In this process, ongoing technological innovation plays a very important role. Viscolube is working at a third reactor

Comparison between characteristics of a SN150 generic virgin base with those of N150 base, regenerated through Revivoil process

METHOD

MEASURING UNIT

SN150

REGENERATED 150N

Colour

ASTM D 1500

–

0.5-1

L 0.5

Flash Point C.O.C.

ASTM D 92

°C

200-220

225

KV 40 °C

ASTM D 445

mm2/s

28-32

28-32

Viscosity index

ASTM D 2270

–

102-105

110-112

Pour Point

ASTM D 97

°C

-9/-12

-6 (-18 with PPD)

Viscosity CCS at -20 °C

ASTM D 5293

cP

2,300-2,400

2,000

Noack

CEC L-40-A-93

% mass

11-12

12-13

Sulphur

ASTM D 5453

% mass

0.8

0.04-0.12

Saturates

ASTM D 2007

% mass

75

82-90 Source: Viscolube.

Viscolube took a fundamental step towards promoting environmental awareness along the whole of the supply chain, carrying out a certification process of its products’ environmental quality.

Case Studies

The quality of regenerated lubricant bases The final lubricant is produced by mixing the base – virgin, regenerated or synthetic – with a series of performance additives that aim to satisfy the specific requests of builders, in both the automotive and the industrial sectors.

There are many parameters that are used to evaluate the quality of a lubricant and they deal with different characteristics: •• the viscosity index: the higher it is, the higher the quality of the lubricant in keeping its viscometryc characteristics stable in a changing temperature; •• the CCS viscosity (Cold Crank Simulator, i.e. the apparent viscosity of a lubricant at low temperature and high shear stress): the lower it is, the better the lubricant; •• amount of sulphur (the percentage of sulphur in the lubricant): the lower it is, the better the lubricant, which, above all, proves more compatible with modern systems of emission gases post-treatment.

Considering all these parameters, Viscolube Revivoil regenerated bases present better features compared to virgin bases: higher viscosity index, minor CCS viscosity, minor presence of sulphur.

In particular, high viscosity index and low CCS viscosity allow, in some case, for a reduced use of additives and other high-cost components. The lower sulphur level, on the other hand, allows limiting the negative effects such as the poisoning of emission gases post-treatment systems used in vehicles.

for the production of Group II+ lubricating bases, while the regenerated bases currently on the market are considered part of Group I+.

This represents a big step in improving quality, a step that offers clients, especially lubricant producers, clear qualitative and competitive advantages.

Once it reaches the “lubricant producer”, the process of awareness acquisition about the environmental and performance qualities of the regenerated bases moves onto the finished lubricant. Furthermore, by operating in their specific supply chain segment, the lubricant producers design their final product on the basis of the specificities requested by the vehicle and mechanical parts’ producers.

Here we arrive at another link in the chain: the users who, by releasing the approval codes that certify the lubricant’s compliance with the requested performances, become witnesses to the quality of the regenerated base product.

The costs of the necessary tests to obtain approval are borne by the producers of bases and additives, with the objective of providing an ever better service to their clients. The latter, by advising on the use of a specific product, “close the circle” of communication, reaching consumers.

“This – Locandro concludes – is the ultimate meaning of the commitment by a highest quality regenerated base producer like Viscolube.

It makes sure that the presence of a regenerated base product becomes a value, which is communicated with pride along the whole of the supply chain, with the aim of generating awareness of what lies behind it and of its environmental benefits.”

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renewablematter 12. 2016

A Journey Where Matter

IS FOR GOOD

Disposing of a ceramic cup in a glass recycling bank.

Or using non-compostable plastic bags to collect biowaste.

Citizens make many mistakes when it comes to separate collection. The objective of Toscana Ricicla is to improve separate collection quality while providing recycling supply chains with better materials.

by Sergio Ferraris

Revet Recycling, www.revet-recycling.com

Sergio Ferraris, an environmental and scientific journalist, is director of QualEnergia.it.

The circular economy. It is difficult to determine where it starts and where it ends. We could imagine a 3D journey in which a circle becomes a spiral and the third axis is represented by the second law of thermodynamics, the one about the irreversibility of physical processes without adding energy. If this was the case, linear economy advocates could be right. They claim that a resource must be exploited full stop while enjoying the benefits of this “development” in the short term. But there is a fly in the buttermilk of this theory: solar energy powers the whole renewable energy system and should do so for the next 4 billion years. In practice, it is this energy that we will need to power the circular economy in the near future, without undermining the second law of thermodynamics. And since this kind of economy works, it must be adjusted so that the waste of energy – and matter – decreed by the laws of thermodynamics is minimized, guaranteeing increasingly better results.

This is the logic inspiring twelve companies in the recycling sector in Tuscany that have tried to go beyond the only worry about the percentage of separate collection and aiming at improving the quality of recycled materials, saving energy and resources in order to minimize as much as possible the effects of the second law of thermodynamics.

And it has not been a simple task. The urban waste sector is indeed the most complex

aspect of the circular economy because its first phase, that of waste production, is very much influenced by sociology.

And when we talk about human activities, of “segments” of society, things tend to become complicated and any attempt to rationalize results is equally complex. While the production of industrial waste is the result of a “simple” process of a sector from which at a certain point a substance or a material is expelled and that can be processed in an unequivocal way becoming, thanks to a rather simple process, a secondary raw material, urban waste has inbuilt in its DNA the complexity of its production. That is human beings.

Its composition changes over time and according to the social class it comes from, depending on what we buy and on our lifestyle and our age group. These are the reasons why the waste question is studied from a sociological point of view.

The initiative devised by the players of the recycling sector in Tuscany is called Toscana Ricicla and aims at improving separate collection quality, focussing on the first part of the chain, the most complex to control and on which then it is necessary to act: source separation.

In our homes.

“The first problem has been identified in the mistakes made in the right conferment of waste by citizens,” claims Diego Barsotti, Revet Recycling Communication Manager, “and that’s why we have devised Toscana Ricicla.” It is an integrated communication platform shared by all to improve the quality of material deriving from Tuscany’s recycling

The Twelve Knights of Recycling Toscana Ricicla Participants: 1. Regione Toscana 2. Aer Ambiente Energia Risorse SpA 3. Asm Ambiente Servizi Mobilità 4. Cis Srl 5. Cispel Confservizi Toscana 6. Geofor Spa 7. Publiambiente S.p.A. 8. Quadrifoglio Spa Servizi Ambientali Area Fiorentina 9. Rea (Rosignano Energia Ambiente Spa) 10. Revet 11. Sei Toscana 12. Sienambiente

Info http://toscanaricicla.com

collection are recycled locally. For instance, all glass is recycled in a plant in Empoli, as well as Tetrapak that in our region does not end up in paper banks like in other areas.”

This material, which until a decade ago was considered by environmentalists as an evil because made of cardboard, aluminium and plastic, now in Tuscany has its own recycling chain that collects it and sorts it.

Once collected in homogenous bales, it is sent to a paper mill near Lucca. Here, a plant for the recycling of this material is able to extract the cellulosic fibres contained, very valuable because they come from Swedish conifer forests, and with which it is possible to produce unbleached kitchen and toilet paper completely derived from recycling.

And the same goes for biowaste. In Tuscany, there are several composting plants where it can be used directly in a short supply chain; pulp paper is also used by paper mills in the province of Lucca.

“Finally,” Barsotti adds, “we have the mixed plastics supply chain that represents our pride and joy compared to Europe and the rest of Italy. Generally speaking, different types of plastic packaging, excluding bottle and phials, are sent to energy recovery because due to the presence of different polymers they are difficult to recycle together.

In Pontedera, Rivet Recycling recovers all mutually compatible polymers and produces granules with a global market because their quality is comparable to that of virgin matter but with a lower cost. So in Tuscany even the mixed plastic supply chain represents the state of the art because in Italy there are only three plants for the recycling of mixed plastics.”

Separate collectioon discarded products

Communicating Recycling

supply chains that are well developed and now need quality second raw materials.

Excellence in Recycling “Tuscany starts from a relatively good separate collection scenario, but it is not excellent since it only represents 44%,” Barsotti continues.

“But what we wanted to develop was the fact Tuscany has an advanced recycling sector, both compared to Italy and Europe, because nearly all materials recovered through separate

Toscana Ricicla, a platform created by communicators within the recycling sector, has two objectives. First: to bring out Tuscany’s pride and joy, that is the recycling sector which is strictly connected to the circular economy and which is also the least known. The second objective is to improve separate collection quality. It targets citizens, and to be more specific, this year it is targeting citizens who are already involved in separate collection but who could improve. In other words, it is addressing problems at source to improve the whole process.

And there is room for improvement.

For instance, on multi-material collection, waste varies between 10 to 15% and it is nearly always due to citizens’ mistakes. Sometimes these behaviours are easily changed. A classic example is that of organic waste collected in non-compostable bags.

But the damage caused is not trivial.

For instance, a single ceramic cup can pollute an entire glass bank. The reason is very simple.

Ceramic does not melt at the same temperature as glass and its fragments are difficult to identify in the material flow and this is why new products, if they contain ceramic, are faulty and must be reintroduced into the system and in doing so ceramic fragments become smaller and smaller and increasingly more difficult to spot. But that’s not all.

The glass recycling supply chain “suffers” due to the presence of pirex and crystal containing silver and lead. This is such a problem in the glass supply chain that it prefers avoiding the conferment of glasses just in case they are made of crystal.

With such a plethora of information to be communicated to citizens, it is clear why Toscana Ricicla communicators wanted to create a coherent information system on recycling, plagued nonetheless by a basic flaw. As a matter of fact, the recycling panorama presents “historical” basic flaws that have never been rectified. The Ronchi Decree, which started separate collection in Italy, stated that implementing decrees with calculation and method standards for separate collection would have been published shortly.

In reality, typology of containers and colour scheme at national level should have been defined. Implementing decrees have never materialized and this is the reason why each municipality, but often even each neighbourhood, has different collecting methods, containers and colour schemes.

“So this is why people living in Florence all year round, when they go to their holiday homes, they are faced with a completely different system from the one they are used to. And this is how mistakes occur,” Barsotti continues.

Toscana Ricicla has been operational for two year and this year it will focus on a type of communication exploiting multimediality to the full: with videos uploaded on websites by local newspapers, on social networks and broadcast by TV channels and radio commercials. They also thought of “targeting” citizens with some viral campaigns.

“We decided to install webcameras pointed at heaps of waste from each supply chains in order to show live, in real time, how much material is wasted despite everybody’s commitment to recycling,” Barsotti carries on.

“We also created a Settimana della qualità (‘Focus on Quality Week’): a regular event where we will present everything that we can do and make at home with recycled materials. An event that after its first edition in Florence – from 18th to 27th November in Piazza della Repubblica – will move to other chief towns in Tuscany. In the meantime, within this project, we are creating videos telling the story of materials and some TV commercials starring Florence-born actress

Daniela Morozzi, a well know actress who played Vittoria Guerra in the Distretto di Polizia series.”

Everything will be available on Toscana Ricicla website where regional recycling data will also be available. The website will also allow people to fill in a questionnaire on separate collection to enter a competition: the winner will win recycled plastic street furniture for his or her municipality: benches, tables, noticeboards and paving.

A firsthand experience of the benefits of virtuous separate collection.

A single ceramic cup can pollute an entire glass bank. The reason is very simple. Ceramic does not melt at the same temperature as glass.

Artificial

AND SAFE

In the past many warnings had been raised about the healthiness of synthetic turf utilizing recycled rubber from used tyres. A recent study conducted over 70 different samples has classified almost 4,000 ELTs has finally shed some light on the matter.

by Emanuele Bompan

They appear as black granules, with the distinctive smell and colour of tyres from which they originate: this is recycled rubber from ELTs. It is precisely because of its smell and colour that such material is often perceived as something suspicious, dirty or even dangerous. The environment where this rubber is used – in most cases – also contributes to generate more doubts on its healthiness: is a material designed to roll on roads suitable to be used as infill in football fields?

Today, artificial turfs are made of carpets of synthetic grass blades (PE or PP) from 5 to 12 cm long, kept upright by a variety of sand infill and elastic granules, including recycled rubber from ELTs. It is thanks to the presence of ELT rubber – in the past only sand was used –

that athletes are guaranteed a higher playing performance on the field.

Over the last 15 years there has been a hot debate on artificial turf: on scientific publications, in international bibliographical analyses and the media. What caused the first doubts about the healthiness of artificial turf using rubber from ELT were the very high temperatures measured in some cases on the surface due to the absence of suitable irrigation and cooling systems.

Clearly, with such conditions, a strong smell of rubber is produced, so much so that the first checks were carried out.

An analysis carried out in Norway showed that on some samples – actually the analysed fields were only three – the presence of PAHs (Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons), phthalates and PCBs (polychlorinated

Case Studies biphenyls). While such substances were detected in minimum concentration that did not pose any risk for human health, the study’s result re-awoke the debate on the healthiness of such materials and the opportunity to use them.

At that stage, to gain a clearer picture of the situation, in various European countries and in the USA, authorities started further investigations over 115 fields and over 150 samples of elastomeric kinds of infill went almost unnoticed. The results were comforting since all analyses showed that the toxicological risk of the infill was quantifiable at levels lower to the threshold value of 1X 10-6, considered by the scientific community “an acceptable risk.”

Unfortunately, the study went almost unnoticed since it was completed only in 2009,

Complexity of the performance infill supply chain

ELT

RUBBER WASTE

THERMOPLASTIC ELASTOMERS (TPE)

“RECYCLED RUBBER”

POLYURETHANES, PIGMENTS, EXTENDERS ETC.

MIX OF PIGMENTS, PLASTIC AND RUBBER

CONTAMINATION due to air pollution deposition

“ENNOBLED RUBBER”

SAND AND RUBBER

TPE OR OTHER “VIRGIN” INFILLS

RE-INFILL (1-3% per year), possible use of other materials

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renewablematter 12. 2016

The analyses showed a reassuring picture confirming the absence of risks for the health of workers and athletes periodically exposed to recycled rubber from ELTs.

i.e. a few years later, when the attention of the media had diminished and directed to more current themes.

Info www.ecopneus.it/en

The recycled rubber granules from ELTs are generally called crumb rubber in the USA and SBR (styrene-butadiene rubber) in Europe.

In actual facts, one cannot tell with an absolute degree of certainty the provenance of materials taken from playing fields under investigation.

Indeed, first of all, a combination of ELT with other rubber waste/discarded materials from recycling plants, which was a common practice, not so much today, cannot be ruled out. Moreover, there is the possibility that rubber granules from other types of waste (for example the rubber fraction coming from vehicle demolition, brake hoses, washers) may be sold as SBR despite not coming from end-of-life tyres.

The presence of substances not used for the production of tyres and the anomalous data measured by a few researchers on a limited number of samples seem to corroborate such hypotheses and raise some doubts on the representativeness of the analysed materials in the past.

Besides, the ban on the use of high aromatic content oils introduced with the new Reach

regulation starting from January 2010, changed the compositions of rubber mixes used to produce tyres sold in Europe and consequently in the rest of the world.

Starting from such considerations, in 2014 Ecopneus (an Italian leading non profit company for the tracking, collection, processing and final destination of end-of-life tyres) started a series of scientific analyses and studies to find out the degree of healthiness of recycled rubber from ELTs and the suitability of their intended uses.

Despite such verifications went beyond the duties derived from the extended producer responsibility of tyres, the role carried out

by Ecopneus in the promotion of the use of rubber granules and powders is undeniable.

Moreover, Ecopneus also manages the flow of ELTs destined for recycling or energy recovery. Therefore it plays an important role in the market, despite keeping out of the business.

The study lasted over two years: the sampling plan made possible a toxicological as well as chemical characterization of recycled rubber from different types of ELTs. In practice, in five recycling plants over 4,000 ELTs have been classified according to their age and country of origin of tyres. Thanks to such operation, supervised by Bureau Veritas auditors, 70 samples of granules and powders whose provenance was known have been handed to four Italian and foreign laboratories for them to carry out a thorough characterization of the rubber.

So, it has been possible to compare the composition of recycled rubber from tyres produced in Europe or outside, before and after 2010.

In the project, Mario Negri-IRCCS – an institute for pharmacological research – measured the content of PAH present in the rubber from ELTs, it assessed its bioavailability and quantified the risks associated with skin and inhalation exposure in the most common scenarios of use.

Meanwhile, the Waste and Chemicals experts have conduced a series of 15 monitoring studies at the football fields with artificial as well as natural turfs in order to ascertain PAH exposure of workers while they were laying the rubber and of athletes during their training matches on the different playing surfaces. Similar monitoring activities have been carried out on 17 road yards during the laying of conventional asphalts and “rubber” asphalts, i.e. with the addition of powder from recycled rubber from ELT. The analyses showed a reassuring picture confirming the absence of risks for the health of workers and athletes periodically exposed to recycled rubber from ELTs, used both as infill in synthetic turfs as well as an additive for road asphalts. Indeed, the PAH content in rubber is very low

Case Studies in the analysed samples: the total of the eight PAHs classified as carcinogenic substances in the 1 B category is between 5 to 10 ppm (1,000 ppm is the threshold for the CLP classification of mixtures as carcinogenic).

Moreover, tests of migration into sweat and pulmonary surfactants carried out by Mario Negri Institute showed poor bioavailability of such substances that are kept trapped within the vulcanized rubber and therefore not absorbed by the human body, neither through the skin nor through inhalation.

Urine tests have also been carried out on workers and athletes to ascertain if due to exposure to rubber there was a variation in the concentration of hydroxypyrene indicating PAH absorption: again, the tests ruled out PAH exposure from ELT rubber.

By way of conclusion, the results of the two-year study and research allow us to define as “safe” the use of recycled rubber from ELTs as infill in playing fields with artificial turf and as an additive for road asphalt.

Recycled rubber from ELTs contain limited amounts of PAH, with an extremely limited degree of bioavailability. The results are consistent with a number of scientific publications carried out over the last ten years and represent a clear and reassuring answer to doubts raised in the past on the safety of recycled rubber from ELTs.

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Intersecting Supply Chains

From waste to protagonist, beans that did not pass the test are used to produce packing paper, to package more beans.

An innovative process stemming from a dialogue between the production chains of two companies and their shared know-how.

by Sergio Ferraris

Project “Save the Waste”, www.savethewaste.com

Intersecting production chains. This could be the key element of the circular economy where the stark difference between twentieth and twenty-first centuries could be noticed, as far as the use of resources in the production processes is concerned.

Indeed, over the whole of last century, the production processes were backed up by discoveries of new materials. In 1953, Nobel-prize laureate Giulio Natta developed, together with Karl Ziegler, a series of catalysts to produce isotactic polymers, which opened the way to new and shocking perspectives in the field of plastics and in 1954, in Russia the first power plant using nuclear matter started to function and such examples could be endless.

Such discoveries on raw materials and energy led most of twentieth century production economies, counting on the fact that the environment – both seen as a resource for raw

materials and end place of destination – could be infinite. A wrong rationale which, if on the one hand provided us with a unique knowledge background, both in quantity and quality, of the history of human kind, on the other it made us aware and able, perhaps to change direction. All this, moving from a linear development that needs exponential growth to a circular one, which, drawing inspiration on the earth system, uses resources many times, keeping their qualities over time, for future generations.

This is not science fiction, but a reality that has already taken root thanks to a small protagonist.

A seed, in other words one of the most humble food known to man whose cultivation has been known for at least 5,000 years: the bean.

Beans, which if dried have the same amount of protein as meat, after feeding and rescuing from famines – thanks to their simple cultivation

Beans disigned by Freepik – graphic elaboration

Cellulose fibre needs allies to produce paper and in such research Favini and Pedon have collaborated to create Crush Fagiolo (“Bean Crush”).

and the possibilities of conservation and their low cost – many generations of the humbler sections of society, today it has become the protagonist of an emblematic history of the circular economy. That of “waste”, which becomes secondary raw material in the same production chain where it has been generated.

A kind of waste going through an identity crisis, unwilling to go out the back door of the plant where it was produced. And this is not happening in a developing country, but in Italy.

Here we are in Molvena, near Vicenza, in the plant of Gruppo Pedon – a company with a turnover of €100 million and 600 employees – holding 50% of the pulses, cereal and seed market all over Italy. It also developed the “Save the Waste” project. “Beans arriving in Veneto by train are already a special type of legume, since it is grown within the economic development and protection programs of farmers, they are not genetically modified and come from selected seeds. We develop ethical supply chains such as that, for example, in Ethiopia where we add extra value to the market price through non-profit organizations,” says Luca Zocca, Pedon’s marketing manager.

“In this way we help local communities, where our suppliers operate and are divided in five cooperatives, with services linked to social promotion, such as education.”

Beans “born” in such a contest are almost naturally committed to new forms of economies such as the circular one. The opportunity is that of getting discarded without becoming waste. Once every single bean has gone out of the plant, it must pass a qualifying examination and those discarded, up to not so long ago, were used in animal feeds, completely separate from human use.

But today, discarded beans become an element of the supply chain, turning into packaging, necessary for the marketing of its “peers”

that, unlike them, have passed the selection process.

So, the company took on a journey into unchartered territory, where new methodologies and production techniques are experimented on existing supply chains without damaging their ability to produce value: the circular economy zone, with its tangible and quantifiable achievements. In this way, beans that were not chosen exit the plant only to re-enter into a nearby company, Favini paper factory, where they are used to devise new ways to “contaminate,” in a positive sense, paper production with other materials, with special attention to waste of other production chains.

Here, from supporting actors beans become protagonists, because they will contribute by 20% to the paper production for other boxes where pulses will be placed. “First of all I would like to shed some light on some unclear facts,” says Achille Monegato, in charge of Favini’s Research & Development department. “Paper is a composite material, which is not only made from cellulose fibre, but from other materials as well. Fibre is indispensible, but it cannot be the only material in paper. There is no 100% cellulose paper anywhere in the world.” So, cellulose fibre needs allies to produce paper and in such research Favini and Pedon have collaborated to create Crush Fagiolo (“Bean Crush”). The former has the know-how developed over a period of twenty years, to be able to decide on the basis of the principles of the circular economy combining waste becoming secondary raw material, processes and raw materials, what and how to combine other materials to cellulose. The latter has the “waste” and the will to grow, through an innovative way, the sustainability of its supply chain. This is what is behind our beans that are now in the limelight thanks to their hidden qualities.

renewablematter 12. 2016

Hidden Qualities

Original Innovation

Pulses are different to cereals since they contain less starch and there are proteins that are only partially or not at all soluble in water. They have hydrogen bonds, so with cellulose they can form chemical and electrochemical bonds, which are essential to shape paper. Our beloved beans, since they are pulses, have all these qualities and can be used as an ingredient for the recipe for paper, provided materials are the right size. Once again, here applied research of the circular economy comes into play. Before, in the production processes ingredients were chosen on the basis of their suitability by composition, but today in the context of a circular economy this can no longer work. Secondary raw materials derived from waste or discarded materials may not be suitable to be used in a supply chain as it comes out of its original production process and that of recycling; for such reason it is necessary to add intermediate working processes within the production process of the material.

This may seem a small detail, but in actual facts it represents a real barrier for the spreading of such processes, but also a competitive advantage for those companies that have already developed and activated them. It is a precious know-how, good for the environment, but also beneficial for our economy. Such important knowledge is well represented by our beloved beans. If some normal paper for photocopiers is made, with 80 gr weight, we need to take into account that it is 100 micron thick, i.e. 0.1 mm: therefore, the materials used must be smaller, otherwise they do not bond with the supporting material. In other words, they can result in a foreign element, making the end product less functional and aesthetically less pleasing.

This substantial problem has contributed in the past to the negative image attached to the early products using secondary raw materials, which must be accompanied by a change in the whole supply chain. Favini owns such additional piece of the supply chain which is a patented micronization process, allowing it to use “different” materials such as beans, while Pedon was aware that the paper factory was able to accommodate beans in an organic way in the production process to obtain the desired product. “Once we understand this, putting together cellulose fibres with other vegetable materials containing starches, proteins and poorly soluble polysaccharides is relatively simple” adds Monegato. “The Pedon case was very interesting and allowed us to experience something unique, because no-one had ever used this material to produce paper before.”

It is interesting to read this experience from a product innovation perspective. It is important to note that the new pulses packaging by Pedon is created in two plants – geographically near, which is significant – comparing the two supply chains and sharing the know-how of the two companies. Such innovation, therefore, comes from the proximity of the two production processes, without forgetting that these must work and produce value as soon as possible both during and after grafting elements of the circular economy. Such level of integration must become the rule, if we want to start to act now, as the climatic/environmental and social crises dictate.

Moreover, at Pedon’s request, the cardboard obtained from beans has been certified for food both in Europe and the US. It is the first packing paper containing manufacturing waste to have been granted such certification.

Such record – besides its undeniable charm – has two qualifying aspects. Thanks to this certification, beans destined for human use do not have to be bagged before final packaging. Result: less waste and economic

The climate is also grateful to beans because, in the packaging processing phase alone, the use of virgin cellulose fibre is reduced by 15% and CO2 emissions by 20%.

Info www.pedon.it/en www.favini.com www.lucaprintgroup.com

Luca Zocca

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Case Studies

saving for the company. And there is more.

Virgin cellulose is strictly FSC certified (Forest Stewardship Council), the transparent window allowing to see the product is in PLA – a plant-based plastic obtained from corn – and as for printing, carried out by the paper packaging company Lucaprint, plant-based inks have been used. The box, therefore, is 100% recyclable in the paper and cardboard supply chain. Waste from production of Crush Fagiolo – 10% of the total – is reintroduced in the Favini’s production cycle. The icing, or rather the bean, on the cake is that all three plants use 100% renewable energy sources. The climate is also grateful to beans because, in the packaging processing phase alone, the use of virgin cellulose fibre is reduced by 15% and CO2 emissions by 20%.

But the economic side of it should not be underestimated. How much does it cost to send our beans to the paper factory to improve the environment?

Economically speaking, packing pulses in this way is still slightly more expensive compared to the traditional way. We are talking about

a few cents of euro per container, but if it is multiplied by thousands of containers it has a certain economic impact. “For us it is a cost whose advantages are recognized especially abroad, by our clients appreciating contents linked to the sustainability of such packaging” concludes Luca Zocca. “We are not the only ones saying this: some market research have confirmed the presence of consumers the world over appreciating ethical and sustainable contents, regardless of a slight increase in price.”

It must be said, though, that the use of such containers is still low and at Pedon’s they aim at reducing the difference in cost between such packaging and the traditional ones thanks to economies of scale introduced by a larger production. And if the race of our bean in the circular economy’s arena has been this successful, it is reasonable to think that the target of cost equivalence is nearer than we may think.

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Mission 99% Accomplished

by Marco Gisotti

Marco Gisotti is a journalist and adviser.

He heads Green Factor, an environmental communication and studies agency.

In Italy, COOU collects 43% of used oils and regenerates more than 99% of them. These spectacular results have been made possible by the businesses’ investments in innovative technologies, as well as by the ability to improve the whole system’s managing model.

Changing often means evolving, keeping up with the times. What seemed to be a pioneering activity more than thirty years ago, when the Mandatory Consortium for Used Oils (Consorzio Obbligatorio Oli Usati, COOU) was created, now has become a reality. Indeed, over the last three decades, waste has finally become a resource, as proved by the very COOU data.

In 2015, according to the latest COOU’s Green Economy Report, the system’s businesses collected about 166,700 tonnes of used oils, which is almost 43% of the total volume of oil consumption during the same year.

Such a percentage nearly equals the maximum hypothetically achievable limit, if we consider that more than half the lubricants are consumed during their use.

Collected oils were destined to regeneration aimed at material recovery in 99.7% of cases, which amounts to 165,500 tonnes, and only 465 residual tonnes were incinerated.

This most important datum, equalling almost 100%, shows an ongoing trend for various years now.

“This was made possible – as we can read in the latest COOU’s Green Economy Report – by the regeneration businesses’ investments in pre-treating processes for the oils entering refineries. This means that, without posing risks to the environment, the share of collected used oils classified as eligible to be recovered as fuel for energy production can be absorbed through the re-refining process, thus making an exception to the technical regulations on used oils’ handling.”

However, not only have the businesses improved their performance, but also the COOU has changed its managing model. Since mid-2014, its role as market operator trading used oils with collecting and regenerating businesses was redefined to become that of a subsidiary operator. Thus, the COOU continues to guarantee and promote collection, but it allows the operators the freedom

Case Studies Managing Used Oils

NEW OILS 386 Regenerated lubricant base oils

166.7 100.1

Collected used oils in the consortium network

The Circular Economy

Industrial waste water

Menaged by the COOU in

Other products (bitumen, gas oils)

2015(kt)

Stocked used oils

1.2

of Used Oils

15.5

Source: COOU, Green Economy Report, 2015.

Oils consumed during use or left out from the consortium 219.3 system

Lubricant oils available for use in Italy

165.5

Used oils for elimination

42 157.6

Oils destined to incineration

165

Processed used oils

0.5

Oils destined to regeneration

7.4 Stocked used oils

With its new management model, the COOU has limited its commercial role and eased direct relationships between collecting and regenerating businesses by modifying its contract agreements with collecting businesses and proposing two different types of contracts.

to negotiate prices for trading used oils destined to regeneration.

The COOU explains that “the subsidiary role defined within this change is maintained as a guarantee against a prospective ‘market failure’, namely in case that the management of used oils destined to regeneration proved uneconomical for businesses in this field – for instance due to the petroleum price volatility – risking that the hazardous waste management is dangerous for the environment.”

From an operational point of view, according to the old model, the COOU had a service contract with authorized collecting businesses which took care of used oils all over Italy at no extra cost for their owners. In order to avoid any risk linked to waste transfer, collected used oils were gathered in storage facilities coordinated by the Consortium and distributed to regenerating businesses or in nearby areas. With the aim

Methods Employed for Managing Used Oils’ from 2013 to 2015

2013

2014

2015

Sent to regeneration

93.9%

91.0%

99.7%

Sent to energy recovery

5.4%

8.7%

0.0%

Sent to incineration

0.2%

0.1%

0.3%

Sent to other types of recovery

0.5%

0.2%

0.0%

Source: COOU, Green Economy Report, 2015.

of guaranteeing a fair treatment, the costs of transfers from the collecting businesses’ temporary storage tanks to the storage facilities were paid by the COOU. Subsequently, oils were analysed and classified according to the most suitable methods of treatment.

With its new management model, the COOU has eased direct relationships between collecting and regenerating businesses by modifying its contract agreements with collecting businesses and proposing two different types of contracts.

The first states that the COOU must give collectors an incentive to collection – including micro-collection – as well as further rewards and reimbursements, whether the collected used oils are transferred to the Consortium or directly to a refinery.

The second, instead, sets a price for the purchase of used oils in the last resort.

It is a tool allowing collecting businesses to hand over used oils to the Consortium at a fair price, should they not manage to sell them at an acceptable price through direct negotiations with regenerating businesses.

Lastly, according to the new model, the COOU maintains its role as a coordinator of storage centres, through which it is able to check the flows and quality of collected used oils in order to classify them before being sold to regenerating businesses.

After this examination, used oils can therefore be traded freely among businesses, while “last resort” oils, namely those bought at a fixed price by the COOU itself, are shared out to regenerating businesses via managed distribution or tender.

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renewablematter 12. 2016 A Comparison of Used Oils’ Management Methods in the Two Models BEFOREHAND

AFTERWARDS

Owners bound to sell used oils collected from the Consortium

None

None

Collecting businesses bound to present a financial statement to:

The Consortium

The Consortium

Collected used oils’ transfer

Collecting businesses transfer used oils to the COOU under the terms of a service contract.

The service contract sets used oils’ transfer price, as well as incentives to collection and micro-collection and various rewards for activities undertaken in collected used oils’ management, according to law obligations. The COOU covers all the costs for used oils’ transfer from collecting businesses to storage facilities.

The COOU has an agreement with collecting businesses based on two service contracts: 1. The first promotes collection and micro-collection, as well as providing an extra reward for activities undertaken in collected used oils’ management, according to law obligations.

2. The second binds the Consortium to buy used oils at a fair price, in case the collecting business did not reach a selling agreement with regenerating businesses.

Collecting businesses are still provided with incentives and rewards by the COOU for undertaking their activities, but nonetheless they can sell used oils to regenerating businesses directly at a price set through direct negotiations. Should the collecting businesses not manage to sell used oils on the market, they can sell them to the COOU at a fair price.

Used oils’ classification and storage

The COOU coordinates storage facilities where all collected used oils are transferred.

The latter are analyzed and classified according to their prospective elimination process.

Unchanged

Collected used oils’ transfer for regeneration

Collected used oils sold to the Consortium are transferred to regenerating businesses, adopting a “managed” distributing system, as stated by the law. The transfer price is calculated according to the price trend of petroleum and petroleum-derived lubricant products. A share of collected used oils is distributed through a call for tenders.

Used oils are transferred to regenerating businesses in compliance with the agreements they reached with collecting businesses.

Before making the transfer, the Consortium checks whether the traded used oils’ quality complies with the current regulations on product characterisation.

Source: COOU, Green Economy Report, 2015.

Sold Oils and Collected Used Oils by the COOU System from 2013 to 2015 (kt) 400

395

387

350

Source: COOU, Green Economy Report, 2015.

386

300

Put on the market

250

Collected Oils

200 171.2

150

166.7

167.4

100 50 0

2013

2014

2015

However, changes do not always guarantee immediate success. Sometimes, it takes months, if not years, to see the first positive results.

This is not the case: the metamorphosis of the COOU’s system has reinforced the collection and reuse trends from the previous years.

Not only has the maximum theoretically possible collection limit been almost achieved, but also the percentage of oils destined to regeneration has nearly reached 100%, an unprecedented result.

“This collection performance – as we can read in the Green Economy Report – is confirmed in the first six months of management of the new operational model as well as throughout 2014 and 2015 as well when the used oils’ trade within the supply chain was carried out mainly through direct agreements between collecting and regenerating businesses. This is a clear sign that the system of Italian businesses in the used oils’ supply chain managed to respond positively to the change of operational model introduced by the COOU.” Another important sign, which needs to be noted and interpreted, is represented by the performances relating to the flow and quality

Case Studies

Info www.coou.it/en/

checks of collected used lubricant oils. In this case as well, no considerable difference has been noticed between the two management models, which proves that the supply chain was ready for the leap.

Indeed, this journey lasted for years, as shown by the achievements in regenerating an ever-growing quantity of oils. Over the years, the performance was uneven, showing both positive and negative trends as well – at least until the beginning of the 2000’s – which then reverted to positive and improved in the last three years of management.

As the Green Economy Report 2015 explains in full details, “the quantity of oils destined to regeneration increased in the last few years because, unlike what happened in the past, a considerable amount of collected used oils classified as eligible to incineration with energy recovery by the COOU were, instead, acquired by regenerating businesses. The latter are authorized to treat these oils as an exception to the technical regulations on used oils’ management, defined by Ministerial Decree 1996, n. 392. ‘Regulation laying down technical rules relating to used oils’ destruction,’ as stated

in article 216 a, paragraph 7 of Decree Law 152/2006 and subsequent supplements.”

However, the Report does not fail to stress that such a transition, which represented a real opportunity, was brought about by the system’s regenerating businesses before the Consortium’s new management model became effective. They contributed “in a positive way to the cycle of mineral oils used following the circular economy’s perspective, all the more so as it was a period of decline in used oils’ availability, because of the structural decrease in lubricants’ consumption.”

In other words, regenerating businesses were able to invest in innovation, by adapting their storage and treatment facilities for incoming used oils to the preflash process.

Therefore, they made it possible to recover materials – including used oils classified as “eligible to incineration” – avoiding risks to the environment, “without compromising the regeneration’s final result, whose percentage is maintained around 65% of the processed used oils, and increasing the overall amount of regenerated base oils produced.”

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More Recycling on the WEB In Italy, 20 million people buy online.

Not only airline tickets and holidays but real objects as well. How to rethink e-commerce packaging to make it more sustainable aiming at rationalization, waste reduction and recyclability.

And making the box the first tool to communicate the product it contains.

by Sergio Ferraris

Following transformations in real time.

This is how we can sum up the new Comieco’s initiative on e-commerce started recently to steer this sector, which is experiencing a strong growth, towards a more sustainable approach.

Its rapid development is confirmed by data showing that over the past five years, e-commerce turnover has doubled and it is now worth 5% of total retail sales in Italy.

By observing this development, Comieco launched its e-commerce project, especially because the trading of “physical” objects is growing exponentially compared to that of services, which is also growing but at a slower pace and which is dematerialized by definition.

E-commerce packaging presents undoubtedly some peculiarities. Not only does it become waste in matter of seconds after entering our homes, but it can be very varied and contain varied materials besides cardboard.

Multi-material waste is the most complex to recycle, with a negative balance from

a circular economy point of view. “We launched this project, which is in its initial phase, exactly because we have noticed an increase in sales and consequently in packaging,” told Renewable Matter Piero Attoma, Comieco’s new chairman. “As a consortium we believe we are able to cooperate with the players representing this kind of activity.”

Sustainability in a Box The challenge is thus to understand whether it is possible to standardize packaging according to materials used, to rationalize it in order to include the basic elements of sustainability and the circular economy such as recycling and waste reduction.

“Today in Italy, there are 30 million internet users aged 15 and above, 20 million of them use e-commerce, this number has doubled since 2011,” tells us Roberto Liscia, chairman of Netcomm, a consortium-like association that brings together e-commerce operators and which is collaborating with

Case Studies

E-commerce in Italy In Italy the e-commerce sector is growing. According to Milan Politecnico Osservatorio e-commerce data presented at the 11th Edtion of Netcomm eCommerce Forum, in 2016, Italians will buy €19.3 billion online, a 17% increase compared to the previous year amounting to €2.7 billion. Here is a breakdown of these data: tourism +11%, IT and electronics +22%, clothing +25%, publishing industry +16%. Made in Italy sectors are also performing well with even higher increases.

Today in Italy, there are 30 million internet users aged 15 and above, 20 million of them use e-commerce, this number has doubled since 2011.

Comieco. A scenario in rapid expansion where packaging represents a very important aspect.

The quantity of goods traded is growing and they are also becoming smaller and smaller; the trial period phenomenon is also increasing with consequent returns, another test for packaging. “In this panorama, it is clear that packaging must be rethought in its entirety: it must be smaller, tailor-made to the object, simple to open and easy to recycle,” Liscia continues.

This is why the work carried out on e-commerce packaging is happening at different levels.

First: packaging optimization according to product type in order to avoid waste; second: choice of material; third: printing, even on packaging, of the recipient’s address.

The last level is to turn packaging into a communication tool, maybe multi-medial, through QR codes.

“With Comieco,” Lisica concludes, “we have created a mixed working group to tackle the following problems: sustainability,

In 2016, Food&Grocery will increase by 29% with a €530 million turnover, while the furnishing sector will grow by 39%, with a €570 million turnover.

On top of this, Beauty and Toys, 16% of e-commerce total, with a €2.214 billion turnover. This sector is also rapidly changing since the online purchase of these products grows at an even higher rate, +27% compared to services, +10%.

At global level, online sales represent only 7% of total sales with a total turnover of $2,700 billion (€2,407 billion), that is 3% of global GDP. 1.5 billion people buy online worldwide. China is ranking first with $900 billion (€802.2 billion) followed by the USA and the UK. In total in Europe, online sales amount to $565 billion (€503.6) with 300 million customers.

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S. Ferraris, “DeVine Land”, Renewable Matter 9 (www.renewablematter. eu/art/195/DeVine_Land)

recycling, the circular economy and unification of standards.”

Within this framework, Comieco wishes to develop the use of packaging made with recycled paper, which presents a huge potential since Italy has a lot of expertise, both in the field of cardboard manufacturing and in the paper-transformation industry.

And there is also another advantage.

E-commerce has no particular requirements for virgin paper because, at the moment, there are not food items that come into direct contact with the packaging.

“The e-commerce sector uses pulp, but we do not know to which extent, since we are in the initial phase of the project and data will become available only over the coming months,” Attoma continues. “Thanks to research, we are currently examining recent developments: Netcomm has a lot of data which unfortunately do not provide specific information on packaging used. Knowing the turnover though, goods’ origin and use, and client typologies of the e-commerce is very important for us. Especially because to act in this sector, and e-commerce is a very complex

one, we need a sound knowledge of it. This is why our collaboration with Netcomm is crucial.”

Being in its initial phase, the project has yet to develop a direct contact with individual e-commerce operators. “What we have understood from this first exploration is that e-commerce operators are trying their best to improve packaging by rationalizing it and this facilitates its recycling,” Attoma continues. “The elimination of plastic and adhesive tape, for instance, represents a step forward towards packaging sustainability since their presence hinders paper recycling.”

For example, over time, e-commerce colossus par excellence, Amazon, has rationalized its packaging, both in its dimensions and in the quantity of materials used.

The Stars-and-Stripes company has produced “easy opening” packaging without metal or plastic tapes and made it possible for clients to leave a feedback about the quality of the shipment and its packaging.

These are activities that only indirectly lead to sustainability, even if they offer substantial

Case Studies material saving, but they also represent a crucial database for the future development of sustainable packaging.

Unknowingly Ecological It is worth making a little digression on this. There are some managing aspects of manufacturing chains that are unknowingly ecological. Energy efficiency and in this case packaging rationalization are choices influenced by drivers other than sustainability – economic savings due to reduced energy consumption for the former, and the need for less space in logistics for the latter – but that must be given great importance because they enter “naturally” into the “classic” or either existing chains. This is why they represent an ideal basis for further developing the circular economy, since they are able to increase the value chain along the supply chain and in doing so they can “contaminate” other activities.

Comieco’s role grafts on this and evolves in a positive yet different direction.

Amazon and Fisher Price, The Pirate Ship Case Fisher Price’s “Pirate Ship” toy is an example of what happens when packaging is changed, from that used for retail to that used for e-commerce.

When packed using Amazon’s optimized frustration-free packaging, as far as logistics is concerned, this toy becomes much more sustainable because: •• its packaging is entirely recyclable; •• it contains five less components; •• 0.5 less square metres of paper is used; •• 380 square centimetres (PVC and metal clips) are eliminated; •• it does not require secondary packaging for shipment.

Info www.comieco.org

The connection that the consortium establishes between companies producing packaging even from recycled paper – first of all paper mills and paper-transformation businesses – and companies using such packaging becomes a sort of business-to-business operation facilitating exchange. Not only of expertise and good practices but also of products. “Comieco’s aim is to fulfil its mission, that is increasing recycling,” Attoma carries on. “It is no longer just a question of promoting recycling by increasing collection but also of identifying and developing intervention areas by paying attention to behavioural and social changes.”

This is the strategy that Comieco is adopting for instance in the case of packaging for Langhe wines and peaches. “Working with the fruit sector we have rationalized the Italian packaging production, so that we have the same dimensions, and that these specifications are adopted and followed by all producers,” Attoma concludes.

“Basically, for a crate of peaches we use fixed measurements, down to the millimeter, with benefits both for the conservation of raw materials and logistics. Our initiative has been copied in Europe showing that when you work well, people follow your example.”

The operation of redefining e-commerce packaging could also be a winning move for Italian design and good practice for the sustainability of the paper sector since packaging is the first contact we have with a purchased item when we receive it and for this reason it can become a communication tool for its manufacturers.

Even thanks to its intrinsic characteristics of sustainability imprinted in its DNA.

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Columns The Media Circle

A Plastic Ocean Roberto Giovannini, journalist, writes about economy, society, energy, environment, green economy and technology.

Film “A Plastic Ocean” , www.plasticoceans.org/ film/

We are constantly reminded how nature on our planet is being impacted on by humanity’s destructive action. The sea and the oceans – spaces that we are used to consider limitless and where extremely powerful natural forces are at play – have been deeply changed and transformed, year after year, during the Anthropocene.

This new era is characterized by mass extinction of plants and animals, the melting of glaciers, billions of fumes releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and above all the extensive and uncontrollable dispersal of plastic in all sorts of environments – a material that does not exist in nature, even though we currently find it in living organisms. This is the subject of A Plastic Ocean, a documentary realized by a team of environmentalists, experts and scientists who spent fours years documenting how 50 years of plastic pollution have changed the oceans.

A Plastic Ocean is not available on TV and in cinemas yet, but we really hope that it will be released soon. British journalist and film director Craig Leeson, together with producer Jo Ruxton and free-diving champion Tanya Streeter, and featuring famous people, such as the great naturalist and documentary maker Sir David Attenborough and researcher Sylvia Earle, manage, through the power of images, to shed light on this alarming phenomenon, making complex scientific information accessible to all. From the depths of the Mediterranean to the coast of Bermuda, to the extremely remote Lord Howe Island in the Tasmanian Sea, it becomes evident that we can’t escape plastic. In Lord Howe Island, 600 km off the coast of Australia, the crew found many birds that had died of hunger, although their stomachs were full of plastic pieces.

In Tuvalu – an atoll in the Pacific Ocean that is not equipped with neither landfills nor plastic recycling and exporting systems – people are forced to throw this material wherever they can, or try and burn it in a disorderly way, creating dense clouds of black smoke that are full of toxic and carcinogenic substances.

As Leeson explains, “The message of this movie is that we have all been told a lie: that we could use plastic freely, throw it away, and then it would stay away forever. With this documentary we want to show that this away does not exist at all.”

Every year at least eight million tonnes of plastics are released into the marine environment.

While in ocean areas where rubbish is concentrated – the so-called “islands” – there are about 750,000 pieces of plastic material per square kilometre, no place that the crew visited all over the world, from Hawaii to the Arctic, presented less than 20,000 micropieces of plastic per square kilometre. This means that there are no longer areas that are uncontaminated by plastic.

This column on the presence in the media of environmental, sustainability and circular economy issues, would really like to feature positive things every edition. This time, however, we are forced to condemn two incredible and worrying decisions that Rai took in the space of a few weeks. Rai is the public channel paid for (compulsorily) by citizens’ licence fees, and for this reason it should have the courage to talk about complex matters such as the environment. The first decision involved cancelling “Scala Mercalli” from Rai3, the programme by Luca Mercalli which, in the first two series, had featured the subject of climate change and its consequences with great effectiveness. “Scala Mercalli” had certainly given rise to a heated debate. But informing and generating discussion is exactly the work of journalists, especially when they are conducting the only programme which deals specifically with what is acknowledged to be the biggest emergency on our planet, climate change. Only a couple of days later, it was made known that “Ambiente Italia” by Beppe Rovera had been removed from the Regional News.

This is a programme that had been broadcast since 1990, it had a very serene style and a simple and understandable voice. Is this the new Rai? A public television channel that won’t deal with the environment?

Columns

Innovation Pills

What Can’t Be Cured Must Be Endured Federico Pedrocchi, is a science journalist.

He directs and presents the weekly programme Moebius broadcast

by Radio 24 – Il Sole 24 ore.

In a previous article I pointed out that a way to spread the underlying message of the circular economy is also by using tricks, for example using certain widespread inefficiencies on which cleverly to intervene and hit the target.

For example: the toilet situation in railway stations. In my first article, I already touched upon the theme of “the use of urine.” I would like to go back to it by answering a question.

In Italy’s large railway stations – by the way they have been heavily renovated over the last few years – there is only one location devoted to lavatories. We are talking about structures – stations – frequented daily by up to a couple of hundred thousand people. Not only that: many of them wait for their connections for up to two hours. So what? Well, architects decided that it is possible to use toilets only by reaching, with all one’s luggage, lavatories that may be (in the case of Rome or Milan) up to 800 metres away, up or down staircases or, with a bit of luck, escalators.

As if it was not enough: since they are paying toilets, there is a gate with sliding doors, which must be crossed with all the luggage, which is also dragged along near the toilet.

Now, since adding more toilets is one of those impossible scenarios, independent toilets could be a solution – disconnected from the sewage system – where urine could be collected encouraging travellers to contribute to a great sustainability and circularity project.

Because with urine, and I’ll say no more, many interesting things can be made. So: forty square metres or so, fifteen toilets and a small cubicle with operators (cooperatives or recycling consortia) promoting the message.

Who knows, even more could be achieved.

In each of these large stations there is a chemist’s. May each of them be given the possibility – it should be promoted with advantages on costs for managers – to open a testing service for hidden blood traces in stools (it has been a reality for years at a regional level) and obviously urinalysis.

In this way, two services would be added to the currently existing one.

And while I am talking about railway stations, allow me to make a brief observation that goes

beyond sustainability. On the new ETR 1000 trains, recently introduced within the high-speed fleet, there is a socket under each seat.

On the ETR 500 it is in front of you, under the table. The new sockets, therefore, are not visible, nor can one lie on the floor because the tray tables do not allow for enough space for such manoeuvre. So, the holes where to insert a plug are not visible. Rumours have it that on some routes children crop up who, in exchange for a few euros, manage to sneak under the tray tables, but this is surely despicable child labour, since as we all know, behind those children there is always an adult exploiting them. I refuse to think that this is all Trenitalia’s doing in order to cut liabilities.

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