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The Circular Economy: Guest Post by Ellen Cowley

What is the Circular Economy?

The circular economy is a model of production and consumption. It is a method of looking at our economy and the life cycle of products with the environment in mind. It encourages reducing, reusing, recycling, repurposing, repairing and sharing resources. 


How it all started 

The idea of the circular economy was first proposed by Allen Kneese in his book “The Economics of Natural Resources” (1988). In 2015, the EU made the first Circular Economy Action Plan. Their aim was to keep the lifecycle of a product infinite, so that instead of ending up in landfill, it would stay in use for as long as possible. They hoped that by introducing incentives for both the economy and the environment, it would get people on board.

The Circular Economy and Climate Change  

The transition to renewable energy is not sufficient on its own to tackle climate change. To tackle 45% of emissions which come from industry, agriculture and land, we need to transition to the circular economy. Completing the picture - how the circular economy tackles climate change is a solution framework that focuses on three main pillars. 1) Designing out waste: if the product is better designed, it is durable, it uses less materials and it is easier to recycle, minimising the chance of it ending up in landfill. 2) Keeping products and materials in use: this involves cutting out single use products and getting full use out of products before buying new ones. 3) Regenerating natural systems: this involves restoring our land through changing agriculture techniques.

Image showing graph of the circular economy

What can we do?

While it may look like we cannot do much as it's mainly to do with production, we are the heaviest influencers of production. If we are buying a lot of a product, the manufacturers of that product must increase the supply to keep up with the demand. If we stop buying single use, poorly made products they will go out of production. We can also recycle, donate or repair things we own to keep their lifecycle going.


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