Circular Economy | Mari Pantsar | TEDxXamk
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwcJveE58Rk Video ID: dwcJveE58Rk ============================================================ so today I'm going to talk about the global sustainability crisis and the solution for it which is the circular economy so we can say that our world is already facing a global sustainability crisis which actually has three dimensions first the biodiversity crisis second the climate crisis and third the overuse of Natural Resources crisis and if we are not able to solve the sustainability crisis we will lose base of everything so we will lose our power to develop our economies our well-being and safety and it is very important that we do not only try to treat the consequences but we must face the root cause itself which is the growing consumption the carbon budget already today is very tight so according to IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change we can emit only 420 Kika tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere if we want to keep the global warming below the critical 1.5 decrease currently the global global annual emissions are 42 Kika tons of carbon dioxide so that means that with the current emission levels we have exhausted the entire carbon budget in less than 10 years so we can say that we are already running against a clock and we have no time to waste we cannot solve the club or sustainability crisis without the transition towards the circular economy because as was already mentioned extraction and processing of Natural Resources caused his half of the global air emissions and over 90 percent of the biodiversity loss and still only 9% of extracted materials remain in circulation only 9% so over 90% of these extracted materials end up in landfills incineration or in the worst case as wastes in the environment but on the other hand this is also a huge business opportunity just think about if we could get keeper almost all the materials in circulation that would require a lot of new innovations and give room many new circular business models but today unfortunately we are very far from the circular economy so we are living in a linear economy and we can say that our world is full of waste but yet the demand for raw material materials is increasing globally all the time so very good question is why do we throw away about 80% of consumer products and they materials and in Europe on average materials are used only once before they end up in final disposal up to 15% of building materials goes to waste during constant construction and only in Europe 1 million tons of e-waste is not recycled annually and he it has also been estimated that by 2050 there will be 12 billion tons of plastic waste in the environment so the world is full of waste but yet the demand of raw materials is increasing so during the next 20 years it has been calculated that we would need 200% more farmland to feed the crowing population we would need hundred and thirty seven percent more clean water 57 percent more steel which is an important construction material for cities and also 32 percent more energy so this equation does not simply work and the solution is the circular economy some define the circular economy as recycling 2.0 but actually the circular economy is much more than recycling I want to see as a whole new economic model where we have succeeded in decoupling the economic growth and well-being from the use of natural resources and in the circular economy we utilize those materials that already exist in in our societies instead of extracting more and more working materials and more and more air pollutions and killing of more and more species so in the circular economy the products are designed so that the materials are kept in circulation and the lifetime of products is maximized and also recycled materials are used as raw material for new products and also in the circular economy ownership of products is replaced by using products and services so today for example we can already get mobility as a service we can get even our clothes as a service or we can get lighting as a service and the circularity of circular economy is inevitable to meet the targets of the Paris agreement because the carbon budget is already so tight that with the current consumption patterns the production and use of only four materials in the world namely cement steel aluminium and plastic would fill the remaining remaining carbon budget alone by the end of this century even if the energy used for production of these materials is low carbon and energy efficiency is maximized but when we use circular economy Messrs we can reduce heavy industries emissions by 56 percent by 2050 in the EU and therefore it is very important that we impede the circular economy in the very core of the net national and also EU and global climate policies so circular economy must be an important part of all the climate policies and the three circular economy strategies that can make better use of the materials in heavy industry to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions include these new circular business models also material recirculation and product materials efficiency I often say that in the transition towards the circular economy we need all actors of the society so every one of us have has an important role so for example if a municipal decision-makers choose to support the circular economy and low carbon transport the the urban planners must design cities for cyclists and manufacturers built bicycles from sustainable recycled and recyclable materials and citizens choose city bikes that completely leased and repairers maintain and fix these bicycles so we all have an important role nobody can make the transition to the circular economy alone this far I have been talking about the circular economy mainly as a solution for the global sustainability crisis but it is actually much more it is a source of new business opportunities it is a source of growth and competitiveness it has been calculated that the additional economic output when we live in circular economy by 2030 can be as high as four point five trillion US dollars a lot of money and by 2050 twenty five trillion u.s. dollars and in EU the EU Commission has calculated that the circular economy can't bring savings for the EU businesses worth of 600 million euros every year by 2030 and that is 8 percent of the total turnover of the European companies and it is of course also a huge business opportunity for us in Finland so many countries have already understood that the future will be circular and the circular economy advances across the globe for example in Finland circular economy is one of the strategic targets of our government and we have built the roadmap towards the circular economy as the first country in the whole world we have also created a world circular economy forum concept which is a leading annual meeting place for circular economy decision-makers all over the world Sweden our dear neighbor is known as he is foreigner in a waste recycling and Japan has been since 1990 the pioneer material flow management and actually chap and hosta together with C Finland the world circular economy forum 2080 in Netherlands there are banks who are promoting the circular economy and the Netherlands will be the circular economy hotspot in to any to any and for example in Canada there is an excellent zero waste Canada program and the leading enterprises have established so-called circular economy leadership coalition that is boosting and accelerating circular economy measures in Canada and next year in 2020 Canada will host the world circular economy forum in Toronto together with Filan so if we take a look to the valence circular economy roadmap as I mentioned this was the world national action plan to watch the circular economy it was built in Finland in year 2016 and the roadmap is called leading the cycle and the targets of the roadmap is at first to support the Finland's government and trace Finland as one of the foreigners in the circular economy in the whole world and one of the objectives is to achieve added value of at least 3 billion euros annually for the economy of Finland and also to create new jobs so the Club of Rome has estimated that the circular economy masers could print 75 thousand new jobs to Finland by 2050 so huge potential for growth and also new jobs and the feeling on circular economy roadmap looks like this it is not a typical road map it is a circular rope roadmap because it is a road map to the circular economy and this road map was prepared in a large stakeholder process so we had a 1000 people taking part in preparing the circular economy roadmap of Finland so we had representative from the universities to the cities from companies to the labor unions and and also from industrial farad Federation's to NGOs and together we defined what are the focus areas of Finland circular economy and we decided that there are four focus areas so sustainable food system of course important for every country forest-based loops the forest industry has always been the backbone of Finland's economy technical loops including the construction sector and manufacturing industry and also transport and logistics and in these focus areas we identified in total 64 concrete projects in fields of primary sector materials processing manufacturing industry all the way to the consumers and use so we want it to optimize the value chain in all these focus areas and also all the individual part SOCAN so we can make the transition towards the circular economy so dear friends the circular economy is my work I do it every day but it is also my passion and I wish that someday and I hope that that day is soon enough I can raise a question so who knows when waste disappeared from the world so we are facing new challenges but I believe that together we can make this you and I thank you [Applause]