Circular Cities

Why should we transition to a #circulareconomy? By taking a circular development approach in cities, we can maximise the use and utility of resources, products, and assets, while minimising resource consumption and waste. This means reducing our environmental impact and ensuring our activities do not exceed the planet’s capacity to sustain us. The circular city of the future will feature modular and flexible #buildings designed for repurposing or disassembly, rather than demolition. Where possible, cities will use brownfield sites and repurpose underused or idle buildings rather than constructing new buildings on greenfield sites. Residents will use clean and shared #mobility systems powered by #renewableenergy. Instead of buying new products, they will lease or share them, and repair them to ensure a long life. Companies will collaborate to recycle by-products and reuse water and heat, thereby generating less waste and saving costs. The tracking of materials and the exchange of products and services will be facilitated by digital tools. This vision for the future is closer than one might imagine, thanks to the support provided by Circular City Centre – C3.   👉Learn more about how C3 can help your city make this circular vision a reality: https://lnkd.in/dikxTUeQ 

🌻European cities are increasingly using circularity to achieve biodiversity and climate goals. Is your city one of them? According to the Circular Cities Declaration (CCD) Report 2024, 78% of cities that signed the declaration include circularity in their strategies. Moreover, cities are increasingly leveraging circular practices to advance climate objectives and bolster biodiversity. These are just some of the insights from the CCD 2024 Report. Discover how European cities harness circular opportunities and tackle challenges along the way: https://lnkd.in/gVfr7p7F Join the movement and commit to the circular economy: https://lnkd.in/d39JRdx The report was led by ICLEI Europe, Circle Economy and Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

We have just published "Designing a circular cities declaration for Japan building on the European Union’s case study" (corresponding author Manuel Herrador Muñoz, PhD) 📃 https://lnkd.in/g39YkMqa Free access link (till June 1) : https://lnkd.in/gC8vBqk6 The paper is designed to propose a common framework, which we can break down into the context of each city, to accelerate the transition to circular cities more broadly in Japan. One of the key takeaways from #WCEF24 accelerators session "Cities & regions getting ahead with the circular transition" is the importance of having a common language for developing circular cities, promoting systematically and financial commitment, leading smoothly to putting it into the context of an individual city. We hope that the paper will be one of the milestones that we can contribute to the development of circular cities. Dr. Lorenz Granrath, Wil de Jong

Exciting news! We're happy to announce the launch of the Circular Innovation Collective program guide! Launched during the #WeekofCircularEconomy2024, the guide is a practical roadmap for local governments to foster circular innovation within their cities and regions. Gathering insights from its first pilot program in the Metropolitan Region Amsterdam, the guide offers practical and comprehensive instructions for scoping out, designing, and executing local innovation programs. Here’s what Egon van Wees from Amsterdam Impact said about the program: "To transition to an impact economy we need to radically change our approach. We need to work with front runners and entrepreneurs that tackle societal challenges and influence the broader ecosystem. With the CIC approach you can do just that.” - Egon Van Wees, Program Coordinator, Amsterdam Impact (CIC program Funder) Wanting to empower other cities and regions across Europe, the CIC is sharing its FREE program guide to accelerate the transition to the new circular economy. Download the guide here: https://lnkd.in/eyH3Djex The Circular Innovation Collective is a consortium of impact-driven organizations initiated by Metabolic, Impact Hub Amsterdam, and Bankers without Boundaries. With the support of the City of Amsterdam (Amsterdam Impact), The DOEN Foundation, and Goldschmeding Foundation, this initiative specifically targeted achieving 70% circular textiles in the Metropolitan Region Amsterdam by 2030. Demonstrating the potential for impactful change, CIC is now dedicated to sharing its knowledge, experience, and strategies in an open-source manner. #circularinnovationcollective #circularcities #ventures

#PublicationAlert: Imagining inclusive circular cities: the role of social fiction in planning education Imagination... Circular Futures... Social dimension.... In 2021, 2022 and early 2023, transformative sustainability educators like Yolan Gielen, Ralf Aschemann, and Santiago PEREZ created space for me to try a more experimental method to teach adults on the social dimension of circular economy and cities in an interactive and reflective way and boost their imagination. These 3 events, and the feedback I got from them and the participants, helped me to develop and reflect on my pedagogy. I still make a lot of mistakes, and that is also part of the journey to become a 'better' educator, facilitor and human. I wrote (and reviewed a couple of times) an educational practice review for a special issue in Planning Practice & Research Journal and learned more more about educational methodologies with the help of the editor, guest editors and reviewers on the methodological and theoretical frameworks. I feel only grateful for the people patient enough to create spaces and opportunities and volunteer their time for me to grow. Abstract: This practice review describes the social fiction method, utilized in combination with debriefing, as a tool to boost imagination and facilitate deep reflection on the social dimension of spatial imaginaries of circular cities and urban metabolism. Using critical social science theories and methods, the educator developed an interactive workshop that prompted adult students to reflect on how their backgrounds and values influence their imagination of what a circular city could be. The study concludes that social fiction can be an effective tool for promoting inclusivity and sustainability in urban planning education. I hope to do more teaching and I hope to use more transformative educational methods in the nearby future. With others we create virtual circles and small events where this described method is implemented, more applied to human nature connection than circular economy. We consider to apply to create a 3 year long Nordic Summer University series on teaching/learning (with) plants, based on research, network and Folkbildning. By then, I like to remind the community here that I work 'only' 80% in Omtre and I am open for offers for teaching positions of 20% ;) This is not open access. However, via this link, the first 50 people can get a free online e-print of this article: https://lnkd.in/dQrd8D8T Picture: Dall-E generated a circular city in Norway based on some prompts that it needs to be surrounded by mountains, water, should have timber buildings etc.... Humans, and machines trained by humans are full of biases, so it is important to reflect why we or a machine imagine a circular city like this.

Our Policy Analyst Sophie Moggs will be speaking alongside a panel of experts to discuss how we can embrace circularity on an urban scale and from a city perspective. Reserve your free spot for the Circular Cities event online, here: https://lnkd.in/eNbnuvcA Discover more about the Foundation's work on circular cities, including case studies here: https://lnkd.in/e46_ngnF