PIA2224 Env Issues & Sustainable Deve, 2024-25 SemA

Friday, 9:00-11:50
YEUNG LT5

Lecture-2: Circular economy and design for

environment

○DONG Liang (董亮）

a Department of Public and International Affairs
b School of Energy and Environment
City University of Hong Kong
liadong@cityu.edu.hk
Outline

• Resources consumption and waste challenges

• Rethink waste: Circular economy as a new model
• Application of circular economy: Life cycle management
and products design for environment (DfE)

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Review: triple bottom line principle of sustainability

Sustainable Development

Environmental
Social Equity Economic Efficiency
Responsibility

•Living conditions •Economic growth •Consumption of

•Equal opportunity •Efficiency and resources
•Social cohesion competitiveness •Materials and wastes
•International solidarity •Flexibility and stability •Risks
•Maintenance of •Production / •Rate of change
human capital. consumption •Natural and cultural
•Employment landscape
•International trade

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17 UN SDGs

4
Review: “Tragedy of the Commons”-manage the
environment as public resource （環境公地悲劇）
• The Tragedy of the Commons is a 1968 paper by biologist Garrett Hardin.
• It is a situation in a shared-resource system where individual users, acting
independently according to their own self-interest, behave contrary to the common
good of all users by depleting or spoiling the shared resource through their
collective action.
• Global CO2 emissions.
• Overfishing.
Hardin, Garrett. "Tragedy of the Commons". Science 162: 1243-1248.

A response to the economist Adam Smith and his disciples that rational decisions
made to promote one's self-interest will inevitably be what is best for the common
good.

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Review: Externality of environmental pollution:
foundation of environmental policy make
People usually can not see this value, that’s why
we put governance & policies to reveal this part
of value

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Application: Governance approaches to regulate the
“externality”

“Valuation” on the environmental value:

• Sewage & pollution charges
• User VS Producer charges
• Tax & subsidy
• Emission permits & trading (week_3)

Each has the merit and challenge

Review: Justice theory：Equality and equity
平等-公平

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Resources consumption and waste
challenges

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Film trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6
qZwo6U5YFY

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Some city facts

Cities account
for about two-
thirds of global
energy
demand.
Buildings Cities produce
produce a up to 70% of
fifth of the global
world’s CO2 greenhouse
emissions. gas emissions.
An estimated
Buildings account 80% of global
for roughly 40% GDP is
of the world’s generated in
energy use. cities.
Building materials: Hong Kong

Steel Sand Gravel

1.54×10 Tg 2.04×10 Tg 2.09×10 Tg

1.04×10 Tg 1.94×10 Tg 1.74×10 Tg

Wood Brick Cement

8.46×10 Tg 1.41×10 Tg 7.90×10 Tg

7.93×10 Tg 1.15×10 Tg 6.31×10 Tg

Y.Luo || L.Dong*, Resources Conservation & Recycling, 2024.

Impacts of construction activities in Cities

• +/- 50% of all material taken from Earth’s crust

• +/- 35% of all greenhouse gases
• +/- 40% of all waste produced (by weight)

• effects on health and productivity of all

• the well-being of largest industrial workforce

General difination of “waste”

Waste (also known as rubbish, trash, refuse, garbage, junk, litter,

and ort) is unwanted or useless materials. In biology, waste is any of
the many unwanted substances or toxins that are expelled from
living organisms, metabolic waste; such as urea and sweat.

Basel Convention Definition of Wastes

“substances or objects which are disposed of or are intended
to be disposed of or are required to be disposed of by the
provisions of the law”
Disposal means
“any operation which may lead to resource recovery,
recycling, reclamation, direct re-use or alternative uses
(Annex IVB of the Basel convention)”
Examples of Urban Wastes

Households
Municipal solid waste (MSW)
• Packaging waste
• Food waste
…

Commerce and Industry

• Municipal solid waste
• Packaging waste
• Food waste
• Bio-waste and residues
• Bulky solid wastes (from industries,
e.g., slags)
The Changing Waste profile

• In view of the on-going social-economic transformation the new

waste profile includes:
• Electronic waste and chemical waste,
• Oil and gas waste,
• Nuclear waste and plastic waste,
• Paper waste and industrial waste,
• Metallic waste and waste water,
• Construction debris,
• Medical and health care waste
• Organic waste

Rising costs of waste management especially to urban authorities

Ways of disposing solid waste

• Disposal without treatment

• Composting
• Landfills
• Recycling
• Incineration
• Energy-from-waste facilities
 Disposal Composting (堆肥)

Landfill Recovery of landfill gases in HK

Incineration

Look outside Look inside

Waste treatment facilities in HK
Example: food waste challenge & treatment in HK

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Solid Waste Management Principles for “sustainability”

• Equity for all citizens to have access to waste management

systems for public health reasons;
• Effectiveness of the waste management system to safely
remove the waste;
• Efficiency to maximize benefits, minimize costs, and
optimize the use of resources; and
• Sustainability of the system from a technical, environmental,
social (cultural), economic, financial, institutional, and political
perspective (van de Klundert and Anschütz 2001)
Rethinking the Waste Concept: From Waste to Wealth

• Traditionally, waste is viewed as an environment and health problem and

therefore a cost to society
• Waste management tend towards traditional than innovative
emphasize the end of the pipe approach (disposal) rather than life cycle
and waste value chain management approaches including waste recycling
or waste minimization.
• The dynamics driving waste generation are set to continue as the country
moves towards middle income status, e.g., Increasing per capita waste
generation rates.
• All these demand for a new thinking at what is traditionally regarded as
waste,
Is what we call waste indeed waste?

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Rethinking the Waste Concept: From Waste to
Wealth

• The rethinking calls for Waste to become Wealth, Refuse to

become Resource and Trash to become Cash (UNEP).
• the rethinking views waste as opportunities with potential to
offer solutions to some of our sustainable development
challenges e.g.
o the increasing scarcity of raw material inputs
o energy to fuel the growing industry and population,
o the urgent need to create jobs for the youths
o finding new streams of income and wealth.

o Hence, we need a new outlook is about eliminating the very

concept of ‘waste’ and recognizing that everything has a value
Circular economy as a new
economic model

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Big picture: What resources do we need with
7% growth and no decoupling?

Doubles global economy every 10 years… http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSrvUzduSALsUFgd-2CiCBEjwJ_ot_8K

..10-fold every 35 years

After about
• 400 yr: an oil barrel the size of the earth
• 300 yr: a resource volume equal to the whole earth
crust
• 200 yr: all water on Earth, including sea water Meer1

• 100 yr: an amount of energy equal to the full solar

influx on earth

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The long-term solution-1: decoupling
Decoupling
• Rise of quality of life
• With less GDP growth
• With less resource/energy use (Higher GDP/unit resource
consumption)
• And absolute lower emissions

Source: International Resources Panel 27

But decoupling has of course limits

Assume zero resource use growth

2010
2050
• 7% economic growth a year -> 7%
more resource-efficient a year?
2100

• Every 10 years: doubled economy,

hence halving resource use per Euro?

• In 100 years: transport services of your

1000kg car must be delivered using
the materials in a Dinky toy

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solution-2 Rethink waste as resources:
From linear economy to Circular economy

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Theoretical foundation: “3R” of Circular economy and waste
hierarchy

Waste hierarchy:

3Rs principle of circular

economy: Reduce, Reuse,
Recycle
Example: food waste treatment in HK under waste
hierarchy

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Example: Monitoring the Circular economy
national policy in Japan

Year 2007

Year 2014

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New Environmental Business Opportunities & 3Rs

“Going green” can be profitable through the expanding market

of environmental goods and services. Recycling market offers a
competitive ‘sink’ as an alternative to increasingly expensive
landfill, incineration, and other treatment options.

• Significant opportunities that exist for the private sectors :

• Equipment & technology: water equipment and chemicals, air pollution control,
instruments and information, waste management (waste minimization, resource
recovery technology, etc), process / prevention technology.
• Services: solid waste management, hazardous waste management, consulting and
engineering, remediation and industrial, analytical services, water treatment
services.
• Resources: water utilities, resource recovery, environmental energy.

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Social system supports
circular economy in urban
waste management

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Waste separation is foundation for CE

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Social system, Trash bin in Japan

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Social system, Trash bin in Singapore

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Market based instruments: motivate to rethink
waste as resources
• Sewage charges (排污收費)
• User VS Producer charges (使用者VS生產者收費)
• Emission permits & trading（排污許可＆交易權）
• Tax & subsidy （環境稅和補貼）

Hong Kong’s waste-charging scheme will require people to pay for

how much waste they produce through special bags. (Image: EPD)

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Environmental education

https://eco-miraikan.jp/en/index.html

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• A metaverse for sustainable fashion

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New social paradigm and fashion

Going green is all about what you

gain, not what you give up Price

Marginal Social Cost (MSC)

Supply (MC)
P*
A B C
PE

PS

Demand

Q* QE QS Quantity of Water

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Challenges: Science driven VS Regulation driven

SCIENCE DRIVEN REGULATION DRIVEN

INDUSTRIAL STRENGTH
BAMBOO WITH ZERO RESIN
ADHESIVE

BROCK COMMONS
TALLWOOD HOUSE
Life cycle management and products
design for environment (DfE)

43
44
2023 Apple
products’
launch
Apple’s plan
towards
carbon
neutrality
2030

45
46
Video: Apple's iPhone
16: Eco-Friendly Design
& Advanced Features
Unboxed

• https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=p9y6xuD-LuE

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Theoretical foundation: Concept of products & service
Life Cycle, and life cycle management

Life Cycle Management is a technique used to quantify the

environmental impact of a product (or Service) from raw material
acquisition through end of life disposition (cradle-to-grave)

Material Component Product Packaging & End of Use &

Processing Use
Extraction Fabrication Assembly Distribution disposal

Manufacturing Reuse
Remanufacture
Recycle

Waste Treatment
Signs of global water scarcity

Cotton for export

Former Aral Sea, Central Asia 49

e.g., Product life cycle (supply chain)
cotton to fashion products
0.16 1.07 Cotton seed oil,
Cotton seed oil
0.47 1.00 refined

Hulling/ 0.51 Cotton seed

Cotton seed
extraction 0.33 cake

0.63
0.18 0.10
0.20
Cotton linters
Harvesting
Cotton plant Seed-cotton Ginning
0.05
0.35 0.10
Garnetted stock
0.82

1.00 Cotton, not Carding/

Cotton lint 1.00 carded or combed Spinning

0.95 Cotton, carded or

0.99 combed (yarn)

Knitting/
0.95
weaving
0.05
0.99 0.10

Grey fabric Yarn waste

Wet processing

1.00
1.00

Fabric
Legend
Finishing

0 .35 Product fraction 1.00

1.00

0 .82 Value fraction Final textile

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Environmental management in a life cycle perspective
• Clean fuel act;
• Road management.

• Cleaner production;
• Eco-design on the product.
• CSR;
• Supply chain management
• Pollution control; • Reuse;
• Industrial symbiosis; • Recycling;
• EPR; • Pollutants regulation;
• EMS • End-of-pipe
• Resource tax;
• Carbon tax;
• Subsidies for Renewable
• Environmental tax;
resources;
• Environmental
• Regulations on resources
education
exploration

Concept Design Raw Retail/

Material Transport Manufacture Transport Consumer Transport Disposal
Extraction Use

Life cycles (Supply Chain) Scope

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Eco-design, Design for the Environment (DFE)
And eco-label

• Design for Environment (DFE) is a method to minimize or eliminate

environmental impacts of a product over its life cycle.
• Effective DFE practice maintains or improves product quality and cost while
reducing environmental impacts.
• DFE expands the traditional manufacturer’s focus on the production and
distribution of its products to a closed-loop life cycle.
• Eco-labelling: label environmental product information refers to any
information on the environmental attributes of products, services, or facilities.

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Fundamental theory: Cost reduction in a life cycle
perspective

Waste Reduction Opportunities in the Life Cycle

Concept Design Raw Retail/

Material Transport Manufacture Transport Consumer Transport Disposal
Extraction Use
Control
Reduce Reuse/Recycle Dispose
Technology

High
Potential for life
cycle cost savings

Cumulative life
cycle costs
Low
Life Cycle management support product design

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Mobility: Smart car

• Designed by Swatch and built by DaimlerChrysler

• Only 2.5 metres long
• Environmental policy and guidelines –
– protection of environment,
– energy efficiency and
– preservation of natural
resources in all stages of life cycle

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Benefits & motivation for DfE: Labels of environmental
friendly: Enhanced market image

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Applications as circular business models

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From producer charges to extended Producer
Responsibility (EPR)

• Concept presented and developed in two reports written by the author to the
Swedish Ministry of Environment in 1990 and 1991
• A principle for policy making:
Extending the responsibility of producers over the life cycle (supply chain) of
the products they manufacture in order to get environmental improvements of
the whole life cycle and in particular the end-of-life treatment.
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WHY EPR: Original Problem
• Costly waste management paid only by municipalities
• More societal and legislative demands:
– to treat waste with better standars
– to recycle more
• This leads to a need for
– more money
– better products (= design changes)

WHY EPR: The “bright” idea

• Engage producers to give incentives for change
• Use knowledge of producers to develop new systems
• Gather enough resources (financial)
Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR)
- a policy principle

• Two groups of objectives:

- Using resources in waste
1. Effective collection
2. High treatment standard
3. Re-use and recycling
- Incentives for design changes

• The one who can change should be given responsibility =

producers
 Review on today’s content

• Types and treatment approaches of urban wastes

• Theory of “waste hierarchy” and Circular economy (3R)
• Theory of life cycle management
• Concept of DfE (for design) and EPR (for management)
• Applications as national policy, products eco-design and circular
business models

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Thanks for your attention☺

☺If you feel interests to my research, pls feel free to reach me☺
liadong@cityu.edu.hk, and via many social networks
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