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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 increased knowledge and understanding as a result of the case study

Increase Awareness

Impact on the ease of innovation, and facilitating uptake of innovations

Innovation

Reduced green house gas emissions released into the biosphere

Reduce Emissions (SDG13)

Minimise waste through diversion: Instead of sending waste to landfill, it is redirected into other industrial processes for handling, treatment, recycling, recovery, or reuse in various forms. 

Minimise waste through design: At the outset of a process of project, plan and design such that there is zero waste or minimal waste during production, use, and at end of life. 

Minimise Waste (SDG12)

Reduced use of fossil fuel energy sources and/or increased use of renewable energy

Reduce Energy Consumption

Providing public and private education and support services at any level or for any profession, and governmental and public administration services, including judicial, regulatory, and legislative activities, taxation, defence, public order and safety, immigration services, foreign affairs and the administration of government programmes

Education and Government Services

Providing electricity and gas services, including traditional and renewable energy generation, natural and manufactured gas and operating gas networks

Energy Utilities and Independent Power Producers

Providing air, water, rail, and land transportation for passengers, such as airlines, airports, ferries, cruise-ships, tour boat operators, marine ports, railways, train stations, tour bus operators, vehicle rental, and taxi companies, travel agencies and related services

Passenger Transport Services

Work together throughout the supply chain, internally within organisations and with the public sector and communities to increase transparency and create joint value

Team up to create joint value

Use digital, online platforms and technologies that provide insights to track and optimise resource use, strengthen connections between supply chain actors, and enable the implementation of circular models



Incorporate digital technology

Engage with the government on circular policies and programmes

Government collaboration

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

Manage

'Mobilise' sets the direction of and builds momentum towards long-term change, while also determining how this direction is determined and governed.

Mobilise

Awareness raising events

Information campaigns

Redesign systems to lay the foundation for circular activities and enable the transition to a circular economy 

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Rethink

Facilitate cross-collaboration by engaging city departments, industries and businesses on ambitious, closed-loop circular projects.

Support closed-loop systems and cross-sectoral synergies

Cities consume about 75% of global energy and emit between 50% and 60% of global greenhouse gases (UN-Habitat). To reduce the negative impact of their energy consumption, cities need to shift away from fossil fuels and move towards renewable energy sources. Such a shift will help cities work towards their climate change mitigation and adaptation action plans. Renewable energy technologies such as wind, water, solar, and geothermal can also help improve access to energy in vulnerable and marginalised neighbourhoods through, for example, decentralised, off-grid solutions.

Renewable energy technologies can harvest the energy in nature’s processes, such as wind, and solar radiation and geothermal heat, that can be replenished within a human lifespan. In contrast, fossil fuels are materials that are not replenished within a human lifespan and are combusted for energy, losing the fuel material and resulting in emissions.

Local governments can develop sustainable energy plans, considering different energy resources and requirements, to develop a robust strategy for the development of renewable energy technologies and infrastructure throughout the city. They can also institute specific legislation and tax systems to regulate energy production and consumption, incentivise research and development of cleaner, more efficient technologies. Via Power Purchase Agreements cities can buy renewable energy from green energy providers and fix the price in order to provide security to financial institutions to finance renewable energy infrastructure. Furthermore, increasing awareness and facilitating capacity-building on planning urban sustainable energy projects can help the uptake of clean energy across the city by different stakeholders—from citizens to businesses and institutions. Facilitating collaboration, then, will be crucial, since private companies operate most of the world’s energy systems.


⚡ Energy Systems

The demand for transport is rising globally—but current modes are heavily material- and fossil-fuels-intensive. Emissions from the transport system could grow by 60% by 2050, and transport is the number-one user of oil worldwide. GHG emissions result not only in warming global temperatures, but also in ocean acidification, which has severe consequences for entire ecosystems and further destabilises our climate. The transport system also drives land-use change and biodiversity loss through the development of infrastructure—also releasing harmful pollutants into the ocean. Key circular solutions:

- Embrace and enable car-free lifestyles
- Invest in high-quality public transport
- Rethink unnecessary air travel
- Electrify remaining vehicles

🚌 Mobility Systems

Businesses

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

Policy Instruments

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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

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Based on the work of [Bocken et al. (2016)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309699661_Product_design_and_business_model_strategies_for_a_circular_economy), the Four Flows Framework serves as a simple framework for managing resource flows in a circular economy by using less (Narrow), using for longer (Slow), using again (Cycle), and using clean, regenerative materials and energy (Regenerate).

These different principles of circular economy can be applied to our socioeconomic metabolism: we can design stocks like buildings, infrastructure, machinery, and vehicles to be rich resource mines for the future, and design manufactured goods and consumables to be cycled and made regenerative. Furthermore, the focus must also centre on getting more value out of fewer materials. Achieving the aims of a circular economy—minimising material use, regenerating the Earth, and preventing material losses—can be done through these four key strategies mentioned above.

Source: Circle Economy. (2023). *[The circularity gap report 2023](https://www.circularity-gap.world/2023)* (p.22). Amsterdam: Circle Economy. 

Four Flows Framework

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      Circular city initiative  Circular Cities Circular strategy CleanTech Garden KIEPPI Sitra Smart and Clean Kera  Espoo, the second largest city in Finland, can proudly call itself one of Europe’s most sustainable cities. The city ranked number one in two sustainability benchmark studies of 145 European cities conducted by Tilburg University in 2016 and 2017.1,2 The studies have triggered an ambition in the city to maintain its position as the most sustainable city in Europe, fostering the implementation of more sustainable projects. Espoo has currently embraced the circular economy concept as an important means to retain its position among Europe’s sustainability trailblazers.
    Espoo’s journey towards sustainability started with a city council that strongly believed that cities need to be sustainable to thrive. In recent years, the city has invested in public transportation, introduced city bikes, founded several new nature-conservation areas, hosted campaigns on sustainable lifestyles, and introduced an ambitious plan for carbon neutral district heating by year 2025.
The city’s integrated perspective on sustainability is reflected in its Sustainable Espoo development programme . The programme sets the following targets:
Build a sustainable Espoo by using smart solutions;
Develop streamlined and sustainable transportation;
Create emission-free energy production and smart energy solutions;
Help the citizens of Espoo to live sustainably;
Integrate the city better in the surrounding environment.
These targets guide Espoo in the selection and initiation of new projects. Stakeholders are regularly invited by the municipality to discuss new project ideas, thus ensuring continued public engagement and the involvement of the local business community. When a project idea is identified, Espoo assigns one project manager who can act as a point of contact for the municipality and who is accessible for the involved stakeholders.
The programme does not specifically refer to the circular economy, because circularity is considered to be important for all sustainable solutions.
Circular economy in the Kera district
As part of the Sustainable Espoo programme, several circular projects are currently implemented. These projects promote sustainable lifestyles, job creation and the growth of circular business activities. Espoo’s main circular projects are implemented in Kera, an industrial district located 20 minutes away from Helsinki.
The Kera district borrowed its name from Kera Oy, a ceramic plant founded there in 1920. The district still houses several companies and was until recently the logistics centre of a large retailing cooperative. The announcement that the cooperative will move its logistics centre out of the city opened opportunities to use this space for different purposes.
Espoo has formulated the ambition to develop Kera into an international example of a circular economy district. The city has initiated several projects that contribute to that ambition:
Smart and Clean Kera project : Kera’s industrial district will be turned into a smart and circular city district that consists of repurposed buildings and new circular buildings. The buildings will be residential, creating housing for around 14,000 residents, as well as commercial, providing office space for around 10,000 people. It is foreseen that over a third of the new residents will live in the area that was until recently the logistics centre. A physical hub in the district will be created to facilitate the co-creation of new circular ideas via networking, experimenting and prototyping. The hub will be supported by a digital platform where digital solutions and applications can be tested. The Smart and Clean Kera project is partly funded by the Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra  and is a collaboration with the Smart & Clean Foundation of the Helsinki Metropolitan Area .
KIEPPI project : Through KIEPPI, which is a Partnership Model for Sustainable Neighbourhoods, neighbourhoods like Kera will be developed into sustainable areas that generate new jobs and businesses based on a circular/sharing economy. The neighbourhood concept of KIEPPI entails that the waste from one business is used as a raw material by another business in an industrial symbiosis. The project will host several pilots in Espoo and other participating cities, in which businesses co-operate with other businesses, universities and municipalities to decide on how resources can be used more efficiently. This project is part of the Sustainable Espoo development programme and partly funded through the European Regional Development Fund.
The involvement of businesses is important for the success of the Kera district. After all, companies have to be interested in settling in the area and making the commercial buildings their new offices. The city notices enthusiasm among the business community for circular economy ideas, but also felt restrictions in the type of support that can be provided. Financially supporting companies to develop circular concepts in the area, for example, is restricted by European state aid rules. Frequent dialogues with corporate partners on their long-term strategies, however, has helped the city to overcome this bottleneck.
Lessons learnt
Based on the experience of the City of Espoo with sustainable development and circular economy projects, several lessons can be learnt:
An overarching sustainability or circular economy programme with clear targets mobilises and aligns stakeholders and avoids random project ideas.
Assigning a dedicated project manager from the municipality provides stakeholders with one clear point of contact and helps keeping track of the project’s progress.
Securing financing for circular projects can be difficult, for example due to state aid rules. An alternative to direct financial support is bringing companies together to increase understanding and to align initiatives with long-term strategies. This can enable companies with similar visions to participate or invest in circular projects or districts with circular symbiosis. Learn more about state aid here.
More information
Sustainable Espoo website 
Contact
Helena Kyrki (Manager of Sustainable Development)   References   1. Zoeteman, B., Mulder, R., Smeets, R., and Wentink, C. (2016). Toward Sustainable EU Cities: A Quantitative Benchmark Study of 114 European and 31 Dutch Cities. https://pure.uvt.nl/ws/portalfiles/portal/13611754/16142_85537_UvT_EU_Study_3_gecorrigeerd_def_RM_1_.pdf   2. Zoeteman, B., Paenen, S., Mulder, R., and Wentink, C. (2017). Benchmarking Sustainability Performance of Espoo with Selected EU Cities: A 2017 Benchmark Study of 15 Selected High Scoring Cities in Northern Europe, Prepared for the City of Espoo, Finland. https://pure.uvt.nl/ws/portalfiles/portal/19971591/Benchmarking_Sustainability_performance_of_Espoo_with_selected_EU_cities_2017.pdf    

Finland

Espoo

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Municipality of Espoo

City of Espoo

<p>Espoo, Finland's second-largest city, is believed to be one of Europe's most environmentally friendly cities. In recent years, the city has invested in public transportation, introduced city bikes, built several new nature conservation areas, hosted sustainable lifestyle initiatives, and unveiled an ambitious plan for carbon-neutral district heating by 2025. The city's proactive approach to sustainability is embodied in its Sustainable Espoo development policy, which guides the city in implementing a variety of circular projects currently.&nbsp;</p>