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Infrastructuring the Circular Economy

Author

Listed:
  • André Nogueira

    (Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University, 677 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115, USA)

  • Weslynne Ashton

    (Stuart School of Business, Illinois Institute of Technology, 10 West 35th Street, Chicago, IL 60616, USA)

  • Carlos Teixeira

    (Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology, 10 West 35th Street, Chicago, IL 60616, USA)

  • Elizabeth Lyon

    (Plant Chicago, 4459 South Marshfield Avenue, Chicago, IL 60609, USA)

  • Jonathan Pereira

    (Plant Chicago, 4459 South Marshfield Avenue, Chicago, IL 60609, USA)

Abstract

The circular economy (CE), and its focus on the cycling and regeneration of resources, necessitates both a reconfiguration of existing infrastructures and the creation of new infrastructures to facilitate these flows. In urban settings, CE is being realized at multiple levels, from within individual organizations to across peri-urban landscapes. While most attention in CE research and practice focuses on organizations, the scale and impact of many such efforts are limited because they fail to account for the diversity of resources, needs, and power structures across cities, consequently missing opportunities for adopting a more effective and inclusive CE. Reconfiguring hard infrastructures is necessary for material resource cycling, but intervening in soft infrastructures is also needed to enable more inclusive decision-making processes to activate these flows. Utilizing participatory action research methods at the intersection of industrial ecology and design, we developed a new framework and a model for considering and allocating the variety of resources that organizations utilize when creating value for themselves, society, and the planet. We use design prototyping methods to synthesize distributed knowledge and co-create hard and soft infrastructures in a multi-level case study focused on urban food producers and farmers markets from the City of Chicago. We discuss generalized lessons for “infrastructuring” the circular economy to bridge niche-level successes with larger system-level changes in cities.

Suggested Citation

  • André Nogueira & Weslynne Ashton & Carlos Teixeira & Elizabeth Lyon & Jonathan Pereira, 2020. "Infrastructuring the Circular Economy," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-24, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:13:y:2020:i:7:p:1805-:d:343001
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Daniel A. Salas & Paulina Criollo & Angel D. Ramirez, 2021. "The Role of Higher Education Institutions in the Implementation of Circular Economy in Latin America," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(17), pages 1-27, August.
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    4. Joerg S. Hofstetter & Valentina Marchi & Joseph Sarkis & Kannan Govindan & Robert Klassen & Aldo R. Ometto & Katharina S. Spraul & Nancy Bocken & Weslynne S. Ashton & Sanjay Sharma & Melanie Jaeger-Er, 2021. "From Sustainable Global Value Chains to Circular Economy—Different Silos, Different Perspectives, but Many Opportunities to Build Bridges," Circular Economy and Sustainability, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 21-47, June.
    5. Karpagam Subramanian & Shauhrat S. Chopra & Weslynne S. Ashton, 2021. "Capital‐based life cycle sustainability assessment: Evaluation of potential industrial symbiosis synergies," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 25(5), pages 1161-1176, October.
    6. Sven Kevin van Langen & Renato Passaro, 2021. "The Dutch Green Deals Policy and Its Applicability to Circular Economy Policies," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-17, October.
    7. Jarmo Uusikartano & Hannele Väyrynen & Leena Aarikka-Stenroos, 2020. "Public Agency in Changing Industrial Circular Economy Ecosystems: Roles, Modes and Structures," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(23), pages 1-27, November.
    8. Roman Lacko & Zuzana Hajduová & Marcin Zawada, 2021. "The Efficiency of Circular Economies: A Comparison of Visegrád Group Countries," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(6), pages 1-13, March.
    9. Vera Sadovska & Lena Ekelund Axelson & Cecilia Mark-Herbert, 2020. "Reviewing Value Creation in Agriculture—A Conceptual Analysis and a New Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(12), pages 1-22, June.
    10. Miha Dominko & Kaja Primc & Renata Slabe-Erker & Barbara Kalar, 2023. "A bibliometric analysis of circular economy in the fields of business and economics: towards more action-oriented research," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(7), pages 5797-5830, July.

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