According to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, one of the main international organizations referring to the subject, the circular economy “is a restorative economy that aims to maintain the usefulness of products, components and materials, and preserve their value… minimizing the need of new inputs of materials and energy, and reducing environmental pressures related to resource extraction, emissions and waste.
In this way, we are not talking only about waste or garbage, but about a whole new model of sustainable design, production and consumption, which seeks to put aside traditional linear schemes, giving way to circular schemes, which, inspired by cycles of nature, prevent the products and their components from losing value and ending up as waste, but on the contrary, they are reintegrated over and over again into said production cycle.
Added to the above are methodologies and tools such as the design thinking and the analysis of the life cycle of the products, so that from their design there is a circular approach, and that the value added at each stage is maintained in closed cycles, which do not end with the consumption or use of the product. .
To do this, the circular economy is supported by technical cycles and biological cycles. The first are those that allow the recovery and restoration of the components and/or materials of the products through their maintenance, reuse, redistribution, repair, renewal, remanufacturing or recycling; and this is complemented by biological cycles, which are responsible for the decomposition and reintegration of organic materials into living systems, through nature’s own cycles, for the production of renewable resources.
These models can undoubtedly help the planet and be part of the solution to the great environmental challenges that we face as humanity, and at the same time they can also provide opportunities to create social well-being, economic growth and employment, by optimizing the use of natural resources. and promote the efficiency of the production system.