The Rise of the Circular Economy

Unsustainable resource use is driving climate change, biodiversity loss, and greenhouse gas emissions. It is diminishing human well-being and visiting untold damage upon the biosphere. But a growing number of policy-makers and business leaders think they might have the solution: the circular economy. And Google, it seems, wants to hasten the transition. Just this month, the company launched an online startup accelerator to boost the growth of environmentally focused startups. Specifically, its new 10-week program will assist early-stage tech firms that are working to solve pressing challenges associated with the production, processing, usage, and recycling of physical resources. Google believes that our linear economic model is outmoded — and that now is the time to pay heed to the planet’s carrying capacity and respect its ecological boundaries. The result, it claims, will be a greener, fairer, and safer economy.

The case for sustainability is compelling. But what, in practice, would a circular economy look like? While still somewhat ill-defined, advocates say that it rests on three core principles. The first of these is the elimination of waste; the second is the circulation of goods and materials; and the third is the rejuvenation of nature. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, for instance, argues that waste should actually be viewed as a design flaw; it says that products should be reused, repaired, remanufactured, and then, if necessary, recycled. Landfill should be avoided. This would require a new culture of consumption, but, crucially, would ensure that we obtain as much value as possible from the goods and resources in the economy. If this can be achieved, it would minimize the need to extract raw materials from the earth and allow nature to regenerate. Proponents say this rewilding process should also be supported by clean and sustainable farming and food-production practices that promote soil health, biodiversity, and the flourishing of natural ecosystems.

Now, it’s an ambitious vision but there are plenty of innovative companies already putting these principles into practice and helping us to ditch the ‘take-make-dispose’ economic model. Focusing on waste reduction, for example, is the British startup Notpla; it makes biodegradable food packaging from seaweed. Greyparrot, meanwhile, offers an analytics platform that harnesses computer vision technology to analyze and sort through tonnes of waste to ensure that recyclable materials are not disposed of. Similarly, Recyda has developed a tool that allows consumer goods brands to assess the recyclability of their products’ packaging. And in the food industry there is a growing interest in ‘upcycling’, as exemplified by Atomo, which makes a bean-free coffee. There are firms addressing our second principle, too. Germany-based Grover allows customers to rent tech products, while the fashion platform Sojo offers clothing repair and tailoring services. Finally, there is a whole raft of companies implementing the third principle. Perhaps one of the most exciting of these is GreenWave, a startup that facilitates regenerative ocean farming.

Bringing the circular economy to fruition will take time, but, if it can be achieved, it seems certain that nimble tech startups and their investors will have a major role to play in that process.