What is the circular economy?
A circular economy is restorative and regenerative by design, and aims to keep products, components, and materials at their highest utility and value at all times.
The vast majority of our economic system can currently be defined as linear. We extract resources, which are then transformed into products via the use of labor, energy, and money, and then, soon after their use, these products are thrown away. Every time a product ends up in landfill, not only do we lose the physical resource, but also all of the time and energy that went into its creation. This is commonly referred to as embodied energy or embodied carbon.
These material losses translate to unrealized employment and economic potential. The EPA and the Institute for Local Self Reliance estimate that low-value activities that result in material loss, like landfilling and incineration, generate 1–6 jobs per 10,000 tons of goods disposed. According to Circular Charlotte, recycling generates an estimated 36 jobs for the same amount of material, while reuse, refurbishment, and upcycling are by far the biggest job creators, creating almost 300 jobs for each 10,000 tons of “waste.”
The circular economy – an economic system that aims to reduce waste and maximize resources by prioritizing product longevity, reuse, repair, and renewability – not only eliminates negative environmental impacts and creates new sources of value, but also can be used to spur economic innovation and create new pathways for upward mobility. Within a circular economy, products and materials are circulated for as long as possible, extending product life and enabling more opportunities for material recovery, repair, reuse, and transformation.
Currently, our world is only 8.6% circular, meaning we only recover 8.6% of what we take from the Earth. The rest is thrown away. Our efforts aim to position San Antonio as a municipal leader in the global acceleration towards a circular economy, starting with deconstruction and salvage and a focus on buildings and their materials.
The Worldwide Push Towards Circularity
Industries and organizations worldwide are increasingly recognizing the potential of the circular economy in serving as a catalyst for both efficiency and innovation, providing operational and strategic benefits. Urban areas are ideal for a circular economy system due to their proximity to people, resources, and service providers. Circular innovations in fashion, manufacturing, mobility, food systems, packaging, and more are gaining widespread attention, including funding and resource dedication, for their potential to transform our take-make-waste system.
It is estimated that cities consume more than 75% of the world's natural resources, produce more than 50% of global waste, and emit up to 80% of the world's greenhouse gases. Additionally, in 2017, EPA's waste study named construction and demolition waste as the largest single-stream source of waste in the country - more than double the amount thrown into household trash bins by volume. The architecture, construction, and engineering (AEC) industry as a whole is moving towards practices and policies that prioritize reuse of existing structures and materials in order to minimize unnecessary waste, combat rampant consumerism, and reduce dependency on both renewable and non-renewable resources.
EMBODIED ENERGY
Embodied energy is the energy consumed by all of the processes associated with the production of a building, from the mining and processing of natural resources to manufacturing, transportation, and product delivery. By repairing, restoring, or reusing historic materials and buildings, the inherent embodied energy in existing structures is retained and utilized, and the need for additional energy to be expended on the generation of brand new products is limited.
As of very recently, embodied energy has received a wave of attention from the architecture and design industry both nationally and internationally. In a January 2020 article from Architect's Journal titled, "Virtuous circles: Can reusing building materials in new projects go mainstream?" the reuse of buildings and their materials is referred to as "material stores for the future." Why mine more of our earth to build when we have a resource bank in our cities?
Another January 2020 article, this one from The Guardian, challenged us to consider never demolishing another building. The article references how some estimates place the residual building parts and pieces from a building at 18% its original construction cost - a huge source of value if the materials are removed and extracted to be reused at their most intact state and highest and best use.