Demonstrated environmental, social, economic and political impacts of the systemic circular economy solutions (Circular plastics, batteries, and biobased side and waste streams) in the Nordics
About the project
TREASoURcE was a four-year project (2022-2026) funded by the European Union under the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme. TREASoURcE initiated systemic change by developing systemic circular economy solutions in cities and regions for currently underutilised or unused plastic waste, end-of-life electric vehicle batteries and bio-based waste and side streams. Implementing these solutions together with companies, societies (including citizens, consumers, communities and regional actors) and experts in the field increased product and material circulation in the Nordic and Baltic Sea Regions.
Objectives
01
02
Replicated locally tailored systemic CE solutions in the Baltics, Poland and beyond
03
Inclusive and just transition to CE for all supported by high level cooperation with all relevant stakeholders
Impact
TREASoURcE contributed to significant environmental, social, economic and political impacts, supporting an inclusive and just transition to circular economy for all.
Efficient management and valorisation of local resources
TREASoURcE territories share together an important natural ecosystem, the Baltic Sea, which is subject to unnecessary logistics as e.g. plastic waste is exported and shipped due to lacking waste management infrastructure. Proper management of biobased side and waste streams and circulating nutrients is important to protect the Baltic Sea from eutrophication, which is a major environmental issue in the marine ecosystem. TREASoURcE optimised nutrient recirculation and flows, raw material use and limited the need for land and energy use connected to TREASoURcE’s approach in both production and waste management as well as circular business models.
By 2035, TREASoURcE will have contributed to 9,5 Mtonnes of GHG emission savings
TREASoURcE focused on greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction throughout the whole project, tackling streams that were not circulated and producing added value materials and products for new loops. The focus was especially in urban-rural regions, since it is common that these streams could be circulated but they are produced in a decentralized manner. Greenhouse gas emissions were reduced throughout the project activities and further in widespread exploitation of the project demonstrations and other practices.
Systemic circular economy solutions for sustainable growth of economies, sectors and regions
Local and regional economies and actors had a big role in TREASoURcE, the demonstrations formulated new value chains and business opportunities reaching through the urban-rural settings. TREASoURcE demonstrated new circular business models that were disseminated to primary producers (agriculture) and CE entrepreneurs (reuse, refurbishment) to exploit the new business opportunities.
Methodology
WP1 - CE framework analysis and actions to enhance CE
Work package 1 aims to map the state-of-the-art of circular economy (CE) in the target countries and set up the framework to be applied to the different demonstration work packages (WPs 3-5).
Objectives
- Provide an assessment of how value chains for plastics, batteries, and biobased materials can be optimized in the territorial clusters, from a national and regional perspective.
- Identify opportunities and challenges for circular strategies identified in value chains of plastics, batteries, and biobased materials from national and regional perspectives.
- Map national and regional material flows and relevant value chains to provide a baseline for the demonstrations and replication in WPs 3-6.
Main activities
- Analysis of the current CE roadmaps, strategies and action plans of the targeted countries, cities, rural areas and regions.
- Material flow and value chain mapping of the plastics, batteries, and biobased waste streams.
- Assessments of the targeted value chains, value creation and value chain optimization.
- Regulatory framework mapping (on EU, national regional and local level) for collection, treatment and recycling of plastics, batteries and processing of biobased side and waste streams.
- Review of state-of-the-art technology and best practices for circular strategies in the targeted value chains, practices and framework for eco-design and circular business models.
Expected impact
- Provide key insights on how current roadmaps and legislative and regulatory frameworks promote a circular economy within plastics, batteries and biobased waste streams in the targeted territories.
- Develop knowledge on the material flows and potential value creation for the different waste streams and their associated value chains.
WP1 leaders
Moana Simas, SINTEF
Mari Wardeberg, SINTEF
WP2 - Understanding key stakeholders’ incentive and roles
Work package 2 builds on existing value chain networks in order to establish and strengthen stakeholder engagement structures supporting circular economy transition in TREASoURcE cities and regions. Involving a broad range of stakeholders, the idea is to build long-term cross-sectorial cooperation.
Objectives
- Achieve transparent decision-making processes and transitions to CE supported by relevant stakeholders.
- Strengthen the decision makers capability of enabling CE.
- Learn from stakeholders and understand their perspectives, perceptions and positions in the CE transition.
- Build knowledge and stakeholder capacity to ensure they understand the benefits of CE and can participate in implementing CE on different stakeholder levels.
Main activities
- The structures for stakeholder engagement will be established by setting up cross-sectorial task forces in 3-4 geographical areas. The aim is to cooperate with a broad range of stakeholders.
- Once the stakeholder cooperation established, concrete cooperative actions will be carried out through five different demonstrations, including activities such as workshops for consumers and industry actors, hackathons, fixing workshops, seminars, procurement recipes, and larger cultural and sports events.
Main outcomes
Work package 2 will develop, test and showcase best practices for engagement and cooperation with consumers, citizens, and communities regarding circular economy. This will result in reports, guidance booklets, procurement recipes, and a range of learning materials supporting CE training.
WP2 leader
Jan Bakke, Østfold fylkeskommune
WP3 - KVC-DEMOs: Circular plastics value chain
Work package 3 aims to improve the recyclability of the targeted plastic waste streams (agricultural plastics, municipal waste management mechanical recycling rejects, plastics from batteries) by complementary mechanical and chemical recycling approaches.
Objectives
- Efficient plastic collection, sorting and pre-treatment.
- Mechanical recycling of targeted plastic waste streams.
- Chemical recycling technology to treat rejected plastic waste from mechanical recycling.
- Upgrading technologies to final valuable products.
Main activities
- Collection, analysis, pre-treatment and mechanical recycling of feedstock: The feedstock will be collected and characterised using physical and chemical content.
- Thermochemical recycling of currently non-recycled plastic waste: Technical assessment of pyrolysis process and full-scale testing of feedstock pyrolysis, use of catalyst to improve end product.
Expected impact
- Improved mechanical recycling of targeted plastic waste streams.
- Produced data will be used by the waste handling companies to improve their separation techniques for undesirable contaminants in the waste fractions.
WP3 leader
Christian Lindfors, VTT
WP4 - KVC-DEMOs: Batteries reuse and recycling value chain
Work package 4 explores the potential for use of second life electric vehicle (EV) batteries as energy storage systems.
Main objectives and activities
- Evaluate possibilities and potential for use of 2nd life EV batteries as energy storage systems.
- Demonstrate functionality and sustainability of 2nd life EV batteries in two demo cases for energy storage for solar power.
Main outcomes
Main outcome of this work package is to demonstrate environmental and economic viability of implementing 2nd life batteries in stationary energy storage systems through evaluating different business models and life cycle analysis. Stationary battery systems will be demonstrated through implementation on two different sites in Norway and Finland and data will be collected to validate the environmental gain.
Expected impact
Contributing with data and knowledge to the Replication Handbook and efficient communication to the public will enable increased implementation of 2nd life battery energy storage systems, ultimately establishing a fully circular battery value chain when these batteries are recycled.
WP4 leaders
Fride Vullum-Bruer, SINTEF
Aksel Junge Klemsdal, ReCube
WP5 - KVC-DEMOs: Circular biobased side and waste streams for biogas and fertilizers
Work package 5 aims to strengthen local economies, find added value uses for currently non-used biobased side and waste streams and create new business opportunities. The targeted side and waste streams include for example manure, sludge and grass from agriculture and branches, tops, bark and sawdust from forestry.
Objectives and main activities
- New value chains and business models for unused biobased side and waste streams demonstrated.
- A local circular bioeconomy model created, tested and validated that is ready for replication.
- A functioning e-market and a digital platform for side and waste streams created.
- A tool created to identify local urban-rural symbiosis models.
Main outcomes
- Functioning circular economy e-marketplace and value chain models.
- Tool for modelling local urban rural symbiosis.
- Model for territorial circular economy.
Expected impact
The work package 5 activities will lead to powering local economies through new circular bioeconomy investments. As a result, there will be new business possibilities for rural producers, and local economies will find resource efficient models for their area. The rural and urban areas will work in cooperation through an adapted local symbiosis model.
WP5 leader
Riina Kärki, The Central Union of Agricultural Producers and Forest Owners (MTK)
WP6 - Exploitation, replication and transferable practices
The overall objective of WP6 is to analyse transferrable practices based on the developed and tested demonstrations in work packages 3-5.
Objectives and main activities
- Interpret stakeholder and other relevant analysis results of WP1 and WP2 to realise critical and necessary factors to be taken into consideration in the process to create a replication plan for different target areas.
- Screening of replication target area’s possibilities to gain public and private funding, enhance SME participation, and include other industry value chains related to CE.
- Increase understanding of the created models’ scalability to other CE purposes.
- Case study that includes plans for establishing local plastic waste collection system in the pilot city.
Main outcomes
- A compilation of best replicable CE practices.
- Roadmaps, CE strategies and CE business plans according to the local conditions.
- Logistics and spatial optimisation with adjusted solution for each area.
- TREASoURcE Replication Handbook or replication localisation modelling: a living digital document and guide for public use.
Expected impact
Active collaboration with interested external stakeholders will assure a widespread transfer of information and good practices as well as their uptake throughout TREASoURcE regions and beyond. TREASoURcE demos are all open access and developed so that they are within the project designed, tested and validated and then conceptualised for efficient replication.
WP6 leader
Kaisa Sibelius, Forum Virium Helsinki (FVH)
WP7 - Sustainability Assessments
Work package 7 provides metrics, tools, and data for assessing the sustainability of TREASoURcE solutions.
Objectives
- Identify in secure way solutions that are ill-suited from sustainability perspective.
- Identify critical success factors and potential risks of existing or planned circular systems.
- Generate and document indicator results for stakeholders to enable opinion formulation and informed decisions making.
- Provide guidance and lessons learned to support a sound transfer and replication of successful circular systems.
Main activities
- Developing a framework for sustainability and circularity assessment that integrates impact indicators for sustainability (in a social, environmental, and economic dimension), performance indicators for circularity, and also context indicators.
- In parallel, an assessment toolset will be created, in close coordination with project stakeholders. The toolset will be tailored to expert and non-expert audiences and is to be further complemented by a guideline for data collection, data curation and data maintenance.
- With the framework, the work package will conduct an analysis of the three main project cases: Circular plastics value chain sustainability assessment, Batteries reuse and recycling value chain assessment, and Biobased waste streams for biogas and fertilizers assessment.
Main outcomes
Work package 7 expects three main outcomes. For one, an assessment framework for sustainability and circular economy of circular systems. Second, expert and non-expert tools and a data pool and guideline for project-specific assessments. Third, applied sustainability assessment of the key value chains in the project. Each of these outcomes will also be captured in an extensive report.
Expected impact
The metrics, tools, and data provided by this work package will help understand whether and how far circular economy systems are indeed sustainable, and thus can be applied for finding best ways to transfer and scale up new and existing circular systems. The project outcomes are applied to existing regional value chains, delivering results and supporting the transferability of circular systems of key value chains in the EU. Assessment results will guide initiatives for improved circularity, efficient management and the valorisation of local resources, leading to e.g. the reduction of GHG emissions. It is expected that by 2035, TREASoURcE will have contributed to 9.5 Mtonnes of GHG emission savings.
WP7 leader
Andreas Ciroth, GreenDelta
WP8 - Communication and dissemination
The expected results of TREASoURcE will have a consistent and maximised impact only if communicated and disseminated appropriately, reaching the relevant stakeholders and decision makers that can boost the transition to CE and uptake of CE systemic solutions.
Objectives
- Achieving visibility and making TREASoURcE an active and recognised actor in CE in the territories.
- Engaging and reaching out to stakeholders via communication channels and activities.
- Providing communication expertise to the other WPs in organising various stakeholder engagement workshops, campaigns, and events.
- Raising awareness and deepening understanding of circular systemic solutions by offering fact-based results and policy recommendations.Disseminating TREASoURcE results to ensure maximum exploitation and impact.
Main activities
- Design and implementation of the Communication and dissemination plan.
- Establishing and maintaining active exchanges with stakeholders covering all the targeted key value chains via targeted and tailored communication and dissemination content, tools and channels.
- Close collaboration with the replication and exploitation work package (WP6) for maximised impact during and after the project lifetime.
- Active collaboration with other circular economy projects and the Circular Cities and Regions Initiative (CCRI) to enhance knowledge sharing and a wide uptake of the identified solutions in the TREASoURcE territories and beyond.
Main outcomes and expected impact
Effective cross-WP collaboration with the replication and exploitation activities but also other work packages is expected to result in effective and widespread uptake, replication, scalability and visibility of circular systemic solutions at local, regional, national, European and international levels.
WP8 leader
Kaisa Simola, CLIC Innovation
WP9 – Coordination and management
The aim of the coordination and management work package is to ensure efficient planning, organization, monitoring, and managing of all aspects of a project and to nurture high motivation and good working environment of all involved to achieve project overall objectives.
Objectives and main activities
- Ensure efficient management, timely and quality results according to the work plan, contractual timeframe and budget.
- Provide financial, legal and administrative guidance.
- Organise the necessary management structures.
- Ensure efficient communication between the European Commission and the consortium.
- Organise the Advisory Board and ensure good communication with AB.
- Continuously quality assurance, proper risk assessment and management.
- Ensure efficient data management under FAIR principles.
- Ethics management.
Main outcomes and expected impact
The main outcomes and expected impact of the coordination and management work package are high-quality project results, and ethically compliant and smooth project execution that is operated within the time and budget restraints of the project plan.
WP9 leader
Ugur Kaya, VTT
Circular Cities and Regions Initiative
TREASoURcE was part of the European Union’s Circular Cities and Regions Initiative (CCRI) that seeks to support the implementation of local and regional circular economy solutions. The CCRI is part of the new European Circular Economy Action Plan adopted in March 2020 and also provides a local contribution to the implementation of the European Green Deal and the European bioeconomy strategy. It places cities and regions at the heart of the EU’s green transition. TREASoURcE built close collaboration and synergies with the CCRI and other circular economy projects and initiatives.
Find more information on CCRI’s website