This book aims to provide academic and industrial applications advancing the critical role of circular economy principles in the sustainability of various resources. The latest research and practice in resource sustainability are shared, discussed, and promoted. The core competency of this book revolves around providing recent advances in sustainable consumption and production implementations, developed tools for environmental and sustainability assessment, technological advancements in resource and waste management/treatment, and advances in waste reduction, reuse, recycling, and recovery. Resources are defined broadly to include (1) physical resources: metals, non-metallic minerals, energy, and water (2) biological resources: food, forestry, land, ecological systems, etc., and (3) “misplaced” resources: air emissions, water pollutants, and solid waste. Finally, legislation, and policy implications and recommendations for resources sustainability are concluded.

This book explores the role of law and policy in circular economy transitions and their impacts on justice, including on distributional equity and recognition and procedural rights, especially for people already marginalised under the current dominant economic system. Amid increasing demand for virgin raw materials, and unsustainable consumption and waste disposal that are driving the global ecological and climate crisis, there are growing calls to urgently transition to circular economies. Despite an increasing number of circular approaches being adopted, implemented, and integrated in national and local laws and policies, the number of commercially successful business stories remains isolated. Moreover, questions about whether circular economy laws and policies are delivering fair and just global outcomes need to be addressed. This book examines this significant knowledge gap to understand legal experiences, including justice and equity issues in the global context, so that these can inform wider design and implementation. The book begins by explaining the concept of a circular economy and its context within wider issues of sustainable development and justice. The first part of the book then examines the legal context of the circular economy by analysing legal forms in practice and those recommended in wider scholarship before considering how these could impact on existing inequity and injustices globally. The second part delivers an empirical understanding of the implications of the law on circular economy approaches and the global equity and justice dimensions through two case studies on solid waste management and forestry. The final part addresses legal opportunities and challenges for wider implementation of circular economy approaches that incorporate justice into its framing. This book will be of great interest to students, scholars, and practitioners of environmental and natural resource law and policy, circular economy, industrial ecology, natural resource management, and sustainable development more broadly.

Circular economy principles are driving to overcome the challenges of today’s linear take-make-dispose production and consumption patterns through keeping the value of products, materials, and resources circulating in the economy as long as possible. Sustainable Consumption and Production, Volume II: Circular Economy and Beyond aims to explore the sustainable consumption and production transition to a circular economy, while addressing critical global challenges by innovating and transforming product and service markets towards sustainable development. This book explores how consumers, private sector, relevant international organizations, and governments can play an active role in innovating businesses to help companies, individuals (consumers and citizens), organizations, and sectors, to remain competitive, while transitioning towards sustainable markets and economies. It is of interest to economists, students, businesses, and policymakers.

This book highlights the concepts, issues and policies related to the circular economy. The chapters of this book are designed to include the theoretical approach to the green circular economy, sustainable supply chain and challenges in the green circular economy. The book is a step towards designing sustainable circular economy embedded production and management practices. This book also addresses the capability of green-lean productions and a circular economy to improve resource efficiency and address environmental sustainability issues. Environmental sustainability is a hot topic in politics, science, and industry. There is a need to achieve economic, social, and environmental sustainability goals through adaptations of the green circular economy, which can help minimize greenhouse gas emissions, toxic pollutant releases, waste and energy and resource usage by employing renewable energy concepts and recyclable materials. The production processes must be resource-efficient and environmentally friendly, including green-lean manufacturing. Adopting a circular economy in manufacturing is less evident than green-lean management. However, systematic strategies to bridge this gap have yet to be devised. There is an urgent need to fully explore the Circular Economy concept to attain resource and environmental goals for the sustainability of the environment in the present era of global climate change. Its framework's powerful strategies need to solve the problem created by linear economic growth through industrialization and gross economic growth. There is a need to improve the sustainability management capabilities in the manufacturing and industrial sector to support the circular economy and a need to examine the impact of green human resource management. This book proposes the combined approach of green-lean solutions and a green circular economy. Through this book, we try to produce the content and information in a compiled form to give the audience an understanding of the circular economy concept framework and challenges.

The circular economy is a policy approach and business strategy that aims to improve resource productivity, promote sustainable consumption and production and reduce environmental impacts. This book examines the relevance of the circular economy in the context of developing countries, something which to date is little understood. This volume highlights examples of circular economy practices in developing country contexts in relation to small and medium enterprises (SMEs), informal sector recycling and national policy approaches. It examines a broad range of case studies, including Argentina, Brazil, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Kenya, South Africa, and Thailand, and illustrates how the circular economy can be used as a new lens and possible solution to cross-cutting development issues of pollution and waste, employment, health, urbanisation and green industrialisation. In addition to more technical and policy oriented contributions, the book also critically discusses existing narratives and pathways of the circular economy in the global North and South, and how these differ or possibly even conflict with each other. Finally, the book critically examines under what conditions the circular economy will be able to reduce global inequalities and promote human development in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals. Presenting a unique social sciences perspective on the circular economy discourse, this book is relevant to students and scholars studying sustainability in economics, business studies, environmental politics and development studies.

This crucial Handbook brings together the latest thinking on the circular economy, an area that has increasingly caught global attention. Contributors explore a broad range of themes such as recycling systems and new business models, as well as consolidating the many ways in which the topic has been dealt with in research, business and policy-making. The Handbook of the Circular Economy is not only relevant, but also essential for students, academics, and policy-makers trying to make sense of the plethora of ways in which the term has been applied and interpreted.

This book presents cutting-edge findings that draw on the use of AI, the Industrial Internet of Things, Blockchain, and Co-Analytics for the development of Circular Economy (CE) models to make organizational activities more sustainable. A further goal is the development of Digital Technology (DT)–enabled support tools that can be used to further analyze the impact of DT and CE–enabled operational practices used to achieve resource and environmental sustainability. Digital Technology Enabled Circular Economy: Models for Environmental and Resource Sustainability discusses the integration of digital technology-enabledcircular economy models into the manufacturing industries and its advantages for sustainability. It emphasizes the fundamentals and applications and their enactment, as well as integration for the overall organizational development. The book explains the role of digital technologies in food supply chains and multi-life cycle materials for sustainable development and highlights the development of the workforce to facilitate the implementation of smart and advanced technologies. This book presents the development of DT–enabled support tools used to analyze the impact of DT and CE–enabled operational practices on an organization and efforts to achieve resource and environmental sustainability. Case studies that demonstrate how smart digital technology can help firms improve their long-term performance by embracing circular operation methods are also included. Students, academicians, and researchers, as well as managers and stakeholders who are interested in smart, sustainable production, and consumption, together with managers and stakeholders who are interested in ways of implementing them in their organizations, will find this book of interest. It will demonstrate, via the use of real-world case studies, how smart digital technology can help firms improve their long-term performance by embracing circular operating methods.

The Circular Economy in Europe presents an overview and a critical discussion on how circularity is conceived, imagined, and enacted in current EU policy-making. In 2013, the idea of a circular economy entered the stage of European policy-making in the efforts to reconcile environmental and economic policy objectives. In 2019 the European Commission declared in a press release that the Circular Economy Action Plan has been delivered. The level of circularity in the European economy, however, has remained the same. Bringing together perspectives from social sciences, environmental economics and policy analysis, The Circular Economy in Europe provides a critical analysis of policies and promises of the next panacea for growth and sustainability. The authors provide a theoretical and empirical basis to discuss how contemporary societies conceive their need to re-organise production and consumption and explores the messy assemblage of institutions, actors, waste streams, biophysical flows, policy objectives, scientific disciplines, values, expectations, promises and aspirations involved. This book is essential reading for all those interested in understanding how ideas about the circular economy emerged historically, how they gained traction and are used in policy processes, and what the practical challenges in implementing this policy are.

As the planet’s natural resources continue to be depleted, society’s environmental awareness has grown. Businesses especially are being coerced into incorporating more sustainable approaches to carrying out their activities. Organizations that develop sustainable business strategies that deliver enhanced value by radically reducing material inputs and engaging consumers on circular economy will be well-positioned for success. Mapping, Managing, and Crafting Sustainable Business Strategies for the Circular Economy is an essential reference source that discusses implementing sustainable business strategies as well as economic policies for the modern business era. Featuring research on topics such as global business, urban innovation, and cost management, this book is ideally designed for managers, operators, manufacturers, academics, practitioners, policymakers, researchers, business professionals, and students seeking coverage on utilizing natural resources in the most sustainable way.