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Circle Economy and ICLEI have partnered up to initiate the go to knowledge hub of case studies about the circular economy in cities. The Cities Collection is a repository of case studies that demonstrate the role of cities in the circular transition, and includes policies, business cases and research articles. Cases in the Collection flow into an ecosystem of digital products which support users in transitioning cities to circularity, for example [Ganbatte](https://ganbatte.world/cities/) and <a href="https://circulars.iclei.org/" target="_blank">ICLEI Circulars</a>, both part of the <a href="https://circulars.iclei.org/circle-lab-for-cities/" target = _blank">Circle Lab for Cities Programme.</a>

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Circular Cities

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Policy case

Impact on the availability of resources as well as their effect on living organisms, ecosystems, and components of the environment.

Ecological Impact

Impacts on the financial condition of a company, as well as the the economicconditions of its stakeholders and on economic systems at local, national, andglobal levels.

Economic Impact

Direct and indirect reduction in economic costs

Cost Savings

Reduced green house gas emissions released into the biosphere

Reduce Emissions (SDG13)

Reduced use and withdrawal of water and rate of recycling and reuse of water

Save Water (SDG6)

Societal Services

Providing water and sewage services, including water collection and distribution, water treatment systems and sewage treatment facilities

Water and Sewage

Utilise waste streams as a source of secondary resources and recover waste for reuse and recycling

Use waste as a resource

Replace freshwater with less impactful alternatives and enact water efficiency measures

Regenerative water

'Manage' influences the use and function of physical and material elements within the urban environment. 

Manage

Infrastructure

'Regulate' changes the rules of the systems to achieve compliance through enforcement. 


Regulate

 Regulation

Monitoring & enforcement

Legislation

Develop infrastructure to support resource cycling

Technology standards

Do better with less by using and supporting infrastructure, processes and products that are designed to minimize material, water and energy use and waste generation from production to end of use


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Reduce

Eliminate waste by maximizing the recovery of resources at the end of the use phase so that they can be reintroduced into production processes


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Recover

Process waste into valuable industrial inputs or consumer products; distribute processed waste to users.

Process waste and ensure its re-entry into industry at its highest value

The built environment, including housing, commercial buildings, and the necessary infrastructure for mobility, is essential for our livelihoods, but:
- the extraction of minerals used to produce construction materials is responsible for a quarter of global land use change,
- approximately 40% of global GHG emissions can be attributed to buildings’ construction, use and demolition, and
- construction and demolition processes drive nearly one-third of all material consumption. 

Making the built environment more circular must prioritise a heavy reduction in material use—while also closing the loop on materials and bringing secondary and renewable material choices to the fore. Our four key solutions for the built environment are:
- Make the most of what already exists: Make the most of existing materials by reusing, repurposing, upgrading and renovating following circular approaches. Where new builds are needed, use secondary materials and be as efficient as possible with urban planning solutions that follow circular design principles so that buildings can be reused, repurposed, and easily disassembled in the future.
- Be as energy efficient as possible: From the design phase, utilise circular strategies to create material- and energy efficient buildings. Couple these designs with a rollout of clean energy solutions, and prioritise energy-efficient appliances and retrofitting. 
- Utilise secondary materials: Maximise the high-value reuse of buildings and components where possible. Ideally, enable the utilisation of construction and demolition outputs and ensure that as much of it as possible is recycled to avoid the need for virgin materials, such as sand and gravel.
- Prioritise circular materials and approaches: Transition to using renewable wood, timber or cross-laminated timber instead of steel and concrete, or move to other locally available materials. Utilise mainstream modular construction and prioritise lightweight frames and structures to reduce cement and steel use, as well as green roofs where possible.



🏢 Built Environment

Communities

Governments

Impacts

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Industries

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A framework of policy instruments that enabled and encourage the transition to the circular economy

Policies

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A framework of policy instruments that enable and stimulate the transition to the circular economy

The principles of a circular economy concern designing out waste, regenerating ecosystems and keeping items in use. Decoupling the economy from material flows—improving the rate of resource productivity faster than the economic growth rate—is also a consistent guide. By evolving with the growing number of applications of circular economy principles, and consolidating these strategies across thematic areas, Circle Economy’s Key Elements Framework (KE) renders the elements of the circular economy salient and serves as a basis to derive contextual strategies and interventions. 


The Framework consists of:
- Core Elements: Activities directly handling product or material flows; and uniquely,
- Enabling Elements: those that remove obstacles for core actors.


Key elements of the circular economy

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Circle Economy's framework of strategies and activities that define the circular economy

The Circular City Actions Framework provides urban changemakers with five complementary strategies they can use to start working towards a more circular system. 

The framework is action-based to provide users with concrete strategic directions and showcase the desired outcomes of each strategy. 
The framework consists of five complementary **strategies**, under which **sub-strategies** provide further detail. Finally, each sub-strategy consists of a diversity of tangible **solutions** which are framed in relation to key thematic areas. 

Note: solutions are currently focused on:
- 🍏 **Food systems**
- 🏢  **Built environment**
- 👕📱  **Consumer goods**
- ⚡ **Energy Systems**
- 🚌 **Mobility Systems**
- 💧 **Water Systems**

More thematic areas are coming soon...

'Click through each of the five strategy cards below to explore the framework and circular economy case studies in more depth!'



This framework was developed in collaboration with ICLEI, Metabolic and Ellen MacArthur Foundation with support from the MAVA Foundation. Read more about it [here]( https://circulars.iclei.org/action-framework/). 



Circular City Actions Framework

An action-based framework for local governments working towards circular cities

Thematic Areas

City Stakeholders

Beijing

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City Government of Beijing

"To address water shortages, the local government introduced regulations in 1987 that required all hotels with a construction area exceeding 20,000 m2 and all public buildings exceeding 30,000 m2 (such as schools, universities, train stations and airports) to introduce on-site water treatment facilities to allow for water to be re-used. Text by Christian Binz, Bernhard Truffer and Lars Coenen in https://www.resourcepanel.org/file/323/download?token=oYh3a-SH

Re-using water with on-site wastewater treatment in Beijing

Producing transporation equipment and providing services for thetransportation of goods and people

Transportation and Logistics

Ensure renewable, reusable, non-toxic resources are utilised as materials and energy in an efficient way

Prioritise regenerative resources

Participating in government programmes that support and advance the circular economy

Government programmes

'Incentivise' sends market signals and support to businesses, citizens and governments to promote certain activities.

Incentivise

In cities, logistics is a key part of the mobility system, with freight transport making up on average 25% of traffic in cities, while taking up 40% of the road space, and generating 40% of transport-related emissions ([ICLEI](https://sustainablemobility.iclei.org/framing-sustainable-urban-logistics-in-cities/)). Often, urban logistics and freight vehicles commonly carry loads that are below full capacity, since much of urban logistics is centred around the last- or first- mile which has a strong preference for speed and convenience. This therefore means that more vehicles are on the streets, contributing to increased emissions, congestion and air pollution in urban areas. 

Optimisation of urban logistics systems can reduce the total quantities of vehicles on the roads and associated emissions and congestion. In addition to this, cities that are intrinsically linked to a port can optimise the incoming freight, the logistics of unloading, before such loads enter the urban mobility system. One such example is shared logistics systems that pool resources intelligently via digital systems that can match available load capacity with demand to minimise the total quantity of kilometres travelled and the number of vehicles required. Furthermore, decentralised distribution centres throughout cities can act as hubs for low-carbon and non-motorised logistics vehicles and achieve similar benefits in reducing the number of vehicles driving in cities, which can be particularly effective for last- and first-mile logistics.

Local governments can support such optimisation systems by providing financial and in kind aid to innovations and initiatives that are focused on improving the technologies and processes that underpin and enable urban logistics. To this end, cities can share real-time transport related data to optimise logistics routes and support such innovations. Finally, cities can also leverage regulations to establish a minimum load capacity for logistics vehicles entering (certain parts of) the city. 


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🚌  Optimised & low-carbon freight and logistics systems

Shenzhen

Chengdu

City of Shenzhen

Chengdu Government 

Chinese cities are currently implementing a variety of policies for sustainable freight transportation, including zero emission zones, low emission zones, access restrictions for heavy-duty vehicles and time-window restrictions for light-duty vehicles. In addition to policies for zero emission zones for freight (already in place in Shenzhen) and low emission zone policies (in place in 13 cities), freight access restrictions and permits are a highly popular measure used by Chinese cities to meet zero emission freight objectives and reduce congestion. For instance, in Chengdu, there is no access for deliveries between 07:00 – 10:00 and between 17:00 and 21:00. Between 10:00 and 17:00 only a small number of fleet vehicles are allowed. Most deliveries take place overnight. Demand for access permits in Chinese cities is huge, with some carriers trading the permit on the market. These types of access restrictions are effective for freight vehicle electrification, and have a great potential to gradually evolve into zero emission zones in the future by exempting zero emission vehicles (also known as new energy vehicles in China) from this requirement or providing preferential access to electric vehicles through the use of special permits.