Circular economy: Diagnose resources to optimize reuse of business waste

"Design" business waste to optimize reuse. This is the objective of the project "PROPER Umbria" (Pilot Project for the Efficiency of Resources), conducted by ENEA in collaboration with Sviluppumbria and the multinational Meccanotecnica Umbra, which is available for conducting pilot testing.

"The project is based on the diagnosis of resources, similar to what companies in the energy field do to establish what interventions are needed to improve efficiency", Laura Cutaia, Head of the ENEA Laboratory "Valorization of resources", which coordinates the project PROPER Umbria, explained.

The methodology developed consists in mapping the raw materials and the materials used in production processes, after which the resources are diagnosed and the optimization plan developed.

“The development of a voluntary discipline for resource accounting by companies can be an important opportunity to know the state of resource management and to carry out their monitoring, in order to develop an efficiency plan both at company level and on a territorial scale, also allowing companies to achieve economic benefits”, Cutaia said. “Furthermore, in order to measure the degree of circularity of a company and therefore, on a large scale, the degree of circularity of an industrial system, it would be important to know the quantity and type of waste reused as by-products by companies, an indicator currently not available but extremely useful, "Cutaia said.

Currently, companies are not required to achieve efficiency requirements concerning resource management and consumption, unlike what happens for energy, nor are there any binding or voluntary instruments to carry out their diagnosis.

"It would also be desirable that our Country, systematizing exixting competences and structures, should establish in the short term an ad-hoc National Agency for the use and efficient management of resources, capable of dealing with the entire value chain, from the extraction until the 'end of life' with subsequent re-use-recovery. This kind of agency can be found in many advanced nations, with the task of providing countries with the cognitive tools and programmers for the need and supply of the resources necessary for industrial operation and development, ” Cutaia said.

The project Proper Umbria, funded under the Innetwork 2016-2017 - POR FESR Umbria Region 2014-2020, is part of the circular economy actions -with particular reference to industrial symbiosis -namely a collaboration among industries of different sectors to achieve competitive advantages deriving from the transfer of materials, energy, water and surpluses.

For more information please contact:

Laura Cutaia, ENEA – Head Laboratory “Valorisation of Resources”, laura.cutaia@enea.it