Industry 4.0 and Circular Economy Towards a Wasteless Future or a Wasteful Planet?

How the marriage of Industry 4.0 and the Circular Economy can radically transform waste management—and our world 

Do we really have to make a choice between a wasteless and nonproductive world or a wasteful and ultimately self-destructive one? Futurist and world-renowned waste management scientist Antonis Mavropoulos and sustainable business developer and digital strategist Anders Nilsen respond with a ringing and optimistic “No!” They explore the Earth-changing potential of a happy (and wasteless) marriage between Industry 4.0 and a Circular Economy that could—with properly reshaped waste management practices—deliver transformative environmental, health, and societal benefits. This book is about the possibility of a brand-new world and the challenges to achieve it.  

The fourth industrial revolution has given us innovations including robotics, artificial intelligence, 3D-printing, and biotech. By using these technologies to advance the Circular Economy—where industry produces more durable materials and runs on its own byproducts—the waste management industry will become a central element of a more sustainable world and can ensure its own, but well beyond business as usual, future. Mavropoulos and Nilsen look at how this can be achieved—a wasteless world will require more waste management—and examine obstacles and opportunities such as demographics, urbanization, global warming, and the environmental strain caused by the rise of the global middle class.  

·         Explore the new prevention, reduction, and elimination methods transforming waste management 

·         Comprehend and capitalize on the business implications for the sector  

·         Understand the theory via practical examples and case studies 

·         Appreciate the social benefits of the new approach 

Waste-management has always been vital for the protection of health and the environment. Now it can become a crucial role model in showing how Industry 4.0 and the Circular Economy can converge to ensure flourishing, sustainable—and much brighter—future.  

Antonis Mavropoulos is President of ISWA (2016-2020) and founder and CEO of D-Waste, a company that aims to make waste management services accessible to everyone that needs them. An internationally recognized waste management consultant with working experiences in 30 countries, he has invented the Waste Atlas, designed several mobile apps and information systems, and written many papers and reports. All his writings can be found at his blog wastelessfuture.com.

Anders Waage Nilsen is a business developer, design strategist, investor, technology columnist and public speaker. He is currently developing WasteIQ, a digital platform for public waste management, based on open standards and IoT integrations.

Foreword 1
Foreword 2
Series Preface 
Endorsements
About the Authors 
About the Graphic Designer
Preface
Glossary
List of Acronyms
 
 
1. The End of Business as Usual
The trillion-dollar question
The future is warmer, urbanized, polluted and resource-hungry
It can’t happen again
It’s about people, not waste
About this book
 
2. Understanding Industry 4.0
The four industrial revolutions
Industry 4.0
More with less and the rebound effect
Radical solutions to difficult problems
 
3. Un(Mis)Understanding Circular Economy
A global trend
Circular economy comes from our past
What is a Circular Economy?
From good intentions to science
Circularity is not Sustainability
The butterfly effect
The end of growth as we know it
Circular economy for whom?
It’s huge, systemic, uncertain but urgently needed
 
 
4. Redefining Resources and Waste
Ind4.0 redefines resources
Redefining the term “waste”
Waste hierarchy: upgraded or obsolete?
Sorry, recycling is not circular economy
Waste management goes beyond waste
Final sinks during the anthropocene
Circularities for materials – linearities for people
 
5. Waste Management 4.0
Perceptions and reality
Hardware in waste management
Software in waste management
Selected case studies
The value of openness
 
6. Towards the Digitalization of the Waste Industry
From waste management to resource innovation
Leadership and management
Exploration versus exploitation
From digitalisation to new business models
Democratizing technology
 
7. The Rise of a New Science
The rise of Urban Informatics
Islands of information in oceans of big data
The dark side of the moon
From cities as machines to cities as organisms
Circular economy: Digitized or Dead
 
8. Stairway to Heaven or Highway to Hell?
Circular Economy or Space Race?
Circular Economy and IND4.0 as Essentially Contested Concepts
Squeezing IND4.0 – undermining circular economy
Governance is the key – cities are the lock
Beyond business as usual optimization
Environmental incrementalism? No, thanks
IND4.0 meets the horse manure crisis
No sanitation = No sustainability
Ask Sisyphus the trillion dollars question
 
Epilogue 1 - The Future Starts with You
 
Epilogue 2 - Towards Irreversible Wastelands
 
Index

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