{"id":135588,"date":"2023-12-04T07:09:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-04T06:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/?p=135588"},"modified":"2023-12-04T08:04:25","modified_gmt":"2023-12-04T07:04:25","slug":"circular-bioeconomy-for-the-future-we-want","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/circular-bioeconomy-for-the-future-we-want\/","title":{"rendered":"Circular Bioeconomy for the Future we want"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

2014 was the year when I, as European Commissioner for Environment, introduced the circular economy in the European policy space. It was not a new concept, or unknown to science, but it was new to policy makers. Today, in less than 10 years, the concept is well known, fairly well understood and broadly accepted globally.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

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Janez Poto\u010dnik, Co-chair International Resource Panel \u00a9<\/strong> Cepi<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

This is not a surprise. Circular bioeconomy is the oldest concept on planet Earth. All nature is based on the principles of a circular economy. Nothing is lost and everything has its purpose. We humans, as part of nature, should abide by the same principles. Unfortunately, what seems logical in theory isn\u2019t so clear  in practice . <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the UNEP International Resource Panel, resource use is at the roots of our<\/strong> triple planetary crises<\/strong><\/a>, and the trends are alarming. Resource use harbours deep inequalities: high-income countries have benefitted most, and have driven the planetary crisis, while emerging and developing economies hold least responsibility, and are facing the worst impacts. The central question we should ask is how to meet human needs and maximise our wellbeing in the most energy- and resource-efficient way. For that, we would need to decouple economic growth and wellbeing from unsustainable natural resource use and environmental impacts. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Circular bioeconomy actors, as those gathered in the <\/strong>Circular Choices <\/strong>c<\/strong>oalition<\/strong><\/a>,  are already delivering this decoupling in practice<\/strong>, and are a part of the bigger picture: an economic, societal, and cultural transformation needed to deliver the European Green Deal and Sustainable Development Goals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Policy recognition of the circular economy solutions is encouraging. But if Ellen MacArthur\u2019s famous butterfly would fly, it would be \u2018flying in circles\u2019 as we have done more on the butterfly\u2019s technosphere wing than on the biosphere wing of renewable materials!<\/p>\n\n\n

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Nature provides us with a wide range of services, like the food we eat, the water we drink, and the biomass we use for building houses, chemicals, fuels, clothing, but also with those less tangible benefits, linked to ecosystem services, such as climate adaptation and mitigation, flood prevention by forests and trees, or the pollination of crops by insects. Investment in nature-based solutions offers multiple opportunities to unlock new revenue streams and increase societal engagement.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Future demand for biomass will increase. To exploit the full potential biomass is offering, and since the environmental impacts of biomass use could be high, particularly on biodiversity, some basic principles need to be followed<\/strong>. Clear guidelines and agreed sustainability criteria are essential to establish the needed trust. Greenwashing should be avoided. It would just backfire and reduce the credibility and potential of biomass use. Access to carbon-rich natural systems must be at the condition of limiting biodiversity impacts. The bioeconomy\u2019s potential to address climate change should not be at the price of biodiversity loss. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this area, the EU\u2019s efforts, supported forest-based industries, both in biodiversity protection and in fighting greenwashing need to be recognised. Half of EU forests are certified under PEFC and FSC, which provides a third-party verification of management quality on the ground; more than 50 million hectares of state forests are certified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, sustainably produced biomass is a scarce resource, thus a \u2018cascading use\u2019 approach should be the norm. Biomass sourcing should preferably focus on biomass waste. Priority should be given to long-term uses, where carbon is stored, and in applications where alternative materials with very large impacts can be substituted.<\/strong> For example, plastic with paper in packaging, or steel and concrete in construction.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most circular strategies still focus on cleaning supply chains and optimising classic circular economy strategies, like recycling. They are all needed, but missing major opportunities for improving resilience through reducing demand for energy and materials altogether. What we really need are systemic interventions, which would encourage energy and material efficiency in the first place. Policy attention should be given to most energy and resource intensive systems like mobility, housing, nutrition, and of course energy production. We must reject the assumption that these systems need to be so resource intensive. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Success is about speed and scale, forest-based industries are a rare example of this being achieved. Moreover, lessons learned from the pandemic are encouraging. Faced with great challenges, we are ready to act. Governments do act, when they need to, and  private actors can also be part of the solution. As a society, we are ready and able to accept systemic behavioural changes \u2013 work from home has become widely accepted, and what to say about how common it is for all of us to recycle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The circular bioeconomy has a major potential to provide answers to the challenges we are facing. It is an essential ingredient for living well and thriving within planetary boundaries<\/strong>. But only if it will respect sustainability criteria and avoid the temptations of using shortcuts and prioritising short-term economic gains. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately, changing our relationship as humans that are part of Nature is not only an environmental, but also an economic, equity and security imperative to strengthen collective resilience. This relationship is not stable, nor balanced, and it will need to be resolved either with collective wisdom and cooperation, or in a hard and painful way. More than an economic or a technological choice, this is a moral choice. The future will be green, or there will be no future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

2014 was the year when I, as European Commissioner for Environment, introduced the circular economy in the European policy space. It was not a new concept, or unknown to science, but it was new to policy makers. Today, in less than 10 years, the concept is well known, fairly well understood and broadly accepted globally. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":135593,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","nova_meta_subtitle":"\"Sustainably produced biomass is a scarce resource, thus a \u2018cascading use\u2019 approach should be the norm. Biomass sourcing should preferably focus on biomass waste\" Janez Poto\u010dnik","footnotes":""},"categories":[5572],"tags":[14356,5838,5842,10416,7105],"supplier":[2317,1832],"class_list":["post-135588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bio-based","tag-biodiversity","tag-bioeconomy","tag-biomass","tag-circulareconomy","tag-packaging","supplier-european-commission","supplier-united-nations-environment-programme-unep"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=135588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135588"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=135588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}