posted on 2021-06-17, 08:46authored byAdeline Jerome, Harald Helander, Maria Ljunggren, Matty Janssen
Product level indicators can be essential for companies to guide and monitor the transition
towards a more circular economy (CE). In particular, CE indicators focusing on physical resource flows
are needed for informing businesses on the environmental performance of their product portfolio. Many
of those indicators have been suggested but a robust assessment framework has yet to be developed.
Previous reviews highlighted the limited range of CE strategies covered by one indicator at a time and
recommended the use of a set of indicators to ensure comprehensive assessments. Furthermore, many
existing indicators have only been tested individually on few and simple products. The aim of this study
is to examine the extent to which existing product-level circularity indicators are applicable to real case
studies with different combinations of CE strategies. Starting from a review of the literature to identify
resource-flow based indicators suitable for product-level assessment, 36 indicators are applied to three
real case studies. Challenges linked to a high level of detail in product systems implementing CE
strategies were encountered when applying communicated methodologies and analysing the
quantitative results from the 31 indicators that were successfully applied. This paper suggests selecting
both comprehensive indicators and a range of single-focus indicators to ensure an understanding of the
systemic consequences of implementing CE strategies. The results also demonstrate the importance
of a clear understanding of what is measured and what is missed by a given selection of CE indicators
for informed decision-making
History
Publication
4th PLATE 2021 Virtual Conference, 26-28 May 2021;
Note
non-peer-reviewed
Other Funding information
The Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research