INDUSTRIAL SYMBIOSIS

Industrial symbiosis is a form of brokering to bring companies together in innovative collaborations, finding ways to use the waste from one as raw materials for another.

Local or wider co-operation in industrial symbiosis can reduce the need for virgin raw material and waste disposal, thereby closing the material loop – a fundamental feature of the circular economy and a driver for green growth and eco-innovative solutions. It can also reduce emissions and energy use and create new revenue streams. The FISSAC project worked with stakeholders to understand these aspects and build a model and supported systems that endeavoured to overcome the challenges.

ACTIVITIES

A methodology and a software platform were developed in order to implement the innovative industrial symbiosis model in a feasible scenario of industrial symbiosis synergies between industries (steel, aluminium, natural stone, chemical and demolition and construction sectors) and stakeholders in the extended construction value chain.

It guides how to overcome technical and non-technical barriers as well as standardisation concerns to implement and replicate industrial symbiosis in a local/regional dimension.

It envisages three interventions:

• Manufacturing processes: demonstration of closed-loop recycling processes to transform waste into valuable acceptable secondary raw materials;
• Product validation: demonstration of the eco-design of eco-innovative construction products in pre-industrial processes, under a life-cycle approach;

Industrial symbiosis model: replicability assessment of the model through Living Lab concept.

FISSAC Software Platform

The FISSAC Software Platform aimed to go beyond existing software by integrating their capabilities and adding network analysis functionalities to assess the roles of partners within the industrial symbiosis network and evaluate the success of overall operation using social network analysis (SNA) methodologies.

A knowledge repository was developed to be used as data source for dynamic geo-database web service and provide semantic information on graphical layers regarding climatic, socio economics, financial, energy, material, mobility and all the geo-referenced data useful to the stakeholders. The FISSAC platform is used for the evaluation of the material, energy flow as well as evaluating the environmental impacts and cost of the studied flows.

GO TO THE PLATFORM

Several reports were elaborated including the main project results. To find out more visit the library section of the project website (link).

PARTNERS INVOLVED

FISSAC’s project coordinator was ACCIONA (Acciona Infrastructures S.A., ES) and the project partners were:

• ACR+, Association of Cities and Regions for Sustainable Resource Management (BE)
• UNE, Asociacion Española de Normalización y certificación (ES)
• CSIC, Agencia estatal Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (ES)
• AKG Gazbeton, AKG Gazbeton Isletmeleri Sanayi Veticaretcaret AS (TR)
• Befesa, Befesa Salzschlacke GMBH (DE)
• British Glass Manufacturers Con., British Glass Manufacturers Confederation Limited (UK)
• CSM, RINA Consulting S.p.A. - Centro Sviluppo Materiali S.p.A. (IT)
• D’Appolonia, RINA Consulting S.p.A. | D’Appolonia S.p.A. (IT)
• EKODENGE, EKODENGE Muhendislik Mimarlik Danismanlik Ticaret Anonim Sirketi (TR)
• Ecodek® Specialist Building Products Ltd. (UK)
• FUNAB, Fundación Agustín de Betancourt (ES)
• FENIX, Fénix TNT s.r.o (CZ)
• Feralpi, Feralpi Siderurgica S.p.A. (IT)
• GEONARDO, Geonardo Environmental Technologies Ltd (HU)
• GTS, Glass Technology Services Ltd (UK)
• TRI, Ingenieurbuero Trinius GMBH (DE)
• HIFAB, HIFAB AB (SE)
• KERABEN, KERABEN GRUPO SA (ES)
• OVAM*, Openbare Vlaamse Afvalstoffenmaatschappij (BE)
• RINA, RINA Services S.p.A. (IT)
• RISE, RISE Research Institutes of Sweden AB - SP Sveriges Tekniska Forskningsinstitut AB (SE)
• CBI, RISE Research Institutes of Sweden AB | CBI Betonginstitutet AB (SE)
• SIMBIOSY, Simbiosy - Simbiosi Insutrial SL (ES)
• TÇMB (TCMA), Turkiye Cimento Mustahsilleri Birligi (TR)
• TECNALIA, Fundación Tecnalia Research & Innovation (ES)

* ACR+ member

The project

The PPI4Waste project:

• Identified common needs within the public sector in Europe;
• Created an Interest Group and a Purchasing Community to exchange and collaborate on the topic of PPI4Waste;
• Implemented capacity-building workshops for cross-border public procurement of innovation;
• Promoted dynamic coordinated procurement of eco-innovative solutions in the field of resource efficiency and waste prevention, reuse and recycling;
• Promoted collaboration between the public and private sectors.

In particular, the project aimed to develop know-how on PPI procedures and make state-of-the-art solutions accessible to other procurers. In turn, this was expected to encourage a quicker market uptake of such solutions and improve the quality and efficiency of services provided by public authorities.

Following the termination of the Andalusian Institute of Technology, ACR+ took the lead of the project. The project partners were:

• ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability
• Zagreb City Holding*
• University of Zaragoza
• Mancomunidad del Sur
• RISE Research Institutes of Sweden
• Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment

* ACR+ member

Activities

The PPI4Waste project covers the complete cycle of preparation activities to implement PPI in municipal waste management, separated into 4 main steps. Reports and other material have been developed to summarize and present the work conducted by PPI4waste project partners during each of these steps. This can be considered as a model for the preparation and implementation of public procurement of innovation in the waste management sector.

The project also gave the opportunity to put in contact procurers and suppliers via different types of events and created opportunities for coordinated procurement in the waste management sector.

Project partners worked on the identification and definition of most frequent needs of public buyers in the field of municipal waste management in terms of waste-to-resource challenges or system failures (so-called ‘common needs’), with the view of drawing a map of targeted improvements and possible emerging solutions addressing these needs.

• Report on Agreeing Common Needs: this report presents the methodology designed and applied by the project consortium to prioritize the needs of public buyers and reach an agreement on the ones for which further work has been implemented within the PPI4Waste project. The five identified common needs are the following: bio-waste management, plastic separation, bulky waste management, separate collection for specific waste streams, and decision support systems for waste management.
• State of the Art of Emerging Solutions: this report gives an overall picture of the state of waste management in the European Union analysing how common needs identified during PPI4Waste project are currently addressed in the EU context and focusing on the identification of innovation solutions with high potential for PPI in the waste sector. It focused specifically on three waste fractions: bio-waste, plastic waste and bulky waste.
• Common Report on Targeted Improvments: this report presents the results of the research made regarding the PPI potential for each of the common needs and gives several recommendations regarding three aspects of PPI: the system readiness of waste management at national level, the impact of PPI at system level and the place of PPI in a policy mix.

The fragmentation of demand for innovative solutions and the lack of knowledge regarding the market situation are two well documented barriers to PPI. Thus, the project consortium brought together both the demand and supply sides to gain a better understanding of ready-to-market innovative solutions replying to needs identified at transnational level.

• Meet-the-market activities: market engagement forms a crucial part of the PPI4waste project, building on the needs assessment and feeding into a PPI roadmap which will pave the way for potential future tenders for innovative waste solutions. In order to ensure that suppliers were aware of the needs identified by procurers and waste experts within the project, a series of 4 national market engagement workshops as well as an international workshop were implemented during spring 2016.

  These workshops were intended to facilitate a dialogue between suppliers, procurers, entrepreneurs, consultants and waste experts in order to provide an overview of the current solutions available and in development, as well as giving suppliers and entrepreneurs an insight into what products and solutions they might need to develop in future.

• Desired Performance characteristics: this report defines, describes and provides examples of performance characteristics from a PPI approach and potential actions to be taken by the pilot partners Zagreb City Holding and Mancomunidad Del Sur to face challenges linked with their needs (bio-waste and plastic waste respectively). The identified actions are related to market uptake of innovative solutions, and performance characteristics are used to describe performance-based requirements of these solutions.
• Roadmap for progressive improvement: this report identifies potential actions and future interventions to be uptaken by the pilot partners, Zagreb City Holding and Mancomunidad Del Sur, in order to face their challenges regarding bio-waste and plastic waste respectively, according to their specific conditions, through market uptake of innovative solutions.

After delivering the report of targeted improvements from the demand side, having analysed the market situation, as well as drafting the roadmap for improvement on functional requirements, the next step in the methodology of preparation activities for the procurement implementation is to carry out a feasibility plan to uptake a collaborative PPI and to reduce risks associated with the implementation of PPI. It includes key aspects such as financial modelling, legal framework, and risk reduction strategy.

• Preliminary Contract and financial assessment model: this guide-template of contract model identifies and explains essential clauses that have to be part of the final tenders of Mancomunidad del Sur (Spain) and Zagreb City Holding (Croatia) if they want to buy innovative solutions that are ready to be marketed.
• Common risk management strategy: this report provides an overall vision of risk management in public procurement of innovation, a brief description of the main types of risks that can be faced in these procedures and, finally, a risk management strategy in the PPI4Waste project.
• Training on PPI: as part of the PPI4waste project, a series of national training workshops are organised to help building capacity in public procurement of innovation and show how this can be applied within the municipal waste sector. Some training material is available to support the implementation of similar training activities in other territories.

The programme of the training includes the following sessions:

Brief Introduction to the PPI4waste project;
The need to innovate in municipal waste management;
An introduction to Public Procurement of Innovation;
Key Features for successful innovation procurement;
Innovative approaches to procurement in waste management;
Useful resources and approaches to PPI in waste management.

The last step provides an overview of the main lessons learned during the project and in order to help to set standards for the implementation of PPI in the waste sector.

• Consolidated report of lessons of PPI4Waste for contracting authorities: this report aims to collect the lessons learned during the project, both regarding the needs and barriers of public procurers operating in the waste sector and the possible solutions and opportunities that can be found. A key output is policy recommendations for applying public procurement of innovation in the waste sector.
• Roadmap on joint or coordinated procurement strategy: the purpose of the roadmap is to explore the options procurers have for coordinated procurement as well as joint procurement and, where relevant, map the subsequent steps to be performed for this purpose.

Bringing together the demand and supply side was an important element of the PPI4Waste project to increase the knowledge and drive the uptake of innovative, sustainable and ready-to-use solutions in the waste management sector across Europe.

For that, two communities have been created: the Interest Group and the Purchasing Community. The primary aim of the Interest Group was to foster knowledge and, exchange, while driving the uptake of innovative, sustainable and ready-to-use solutions in the waste management sector across Europe. The Purchasing Community was a sub-group of the PPI4Waste Interest Group consisting solely of public procurers who were interested and actively involved in the procurement of waste management solutions in the public sector.

Webinars have been organised for the members of the Interest Group:

• Experiences and insights in piloting PPI in the waste sector
• What's Waste Worth
• The European Circular Economy Package
  What does it mean for me?

The discussions between members of these communities, initiated during the project lifetime, continue to be open to new contributions via the Procurement Forum.

• Newsletter 5 – November 2017
• Newsletter 4 – December 2016
• Newsletter 3 – June 2016
• Newsletter 2 – December 2015
• Newsletter 1 – July 2015

• Press Release – 14 September 2017 – PPI4Waste Final Conference
• Press Release – 03 May 2016 – International and national Meet-the-market events
• Press Release – 02 November 2015 – Launch of the Interest Group and Purchasing Community
• Press Release – 25 August 2015 – PPI4Waste Website

PAPER FOR RECYCLING

Paper for Recycling is used paper and board separately collected and sorted according to the European Standard List of Grades of Paper and Board for Recycling (EN 643).

• Paper recycling is perceived by the public as being the most effective way to reduce environmental impacts of using paper.
• For the industry, recycled fibres are an indispensable source of raw materials, supporting industry’s resource efficiency.
• For local authorities, collecting separately and recycling paper reduces the amount of waste which has to be incinerated or even landfilled.

ACTIVITIES

IMPACTPapeRec provided an innovative and common knowledge platform, which enables cooperation between the key stakeholders involved in the paper value chain.

Several working groups and discussion workshops were organised with project partners and external experts. Information and data about paper collection and recycling systems were collected for 12 best practices and focus municipalities and analysed in order to set up the benchmarks for the development of the methodology and best practice handbook.

A newsletter, a website and other communication tools were developed in order to make the outcomes available for all stakeholders around the whole paper value chain, including citizens and municipalities.

BEST PRACTICE HANDBOOK

The work in the project led to a final list of good and best practices in collection of paper for recycling which are available on the IMPACTPapeRec project website. A total of 34 practices have been identified and classified in 4 groups:

• Operational aspects;
• Policy, legislation and economic aspects;
• Monitoring and control;
• Information and communication.

One factsheet for each practice has been drafted, including background information, description of the practice, practical example of implementation, things to consider when applying it, advice on how to start and a list of potential benefits.

PARTNERS INVOLVED

IMPACTPapeRec’s project coordinator was ITENE (Instituto Tecnológico del Embalaje, Transporte y Logística) and its project partners were:

• ACR+
• CARR, Centros Comerciales Carrefour S.A.
• CEPI, Confederation of European Paper Industries
• DIN, Deutsches Institut für Normung
• DUPNITSA, Municipality of Dupnitsa
• ECOFOLIO*, Ecofolio
• EEB, European Environmental Bureau
• FENIX, Fenix Dupnica Ltd.
• HAMBURGER, Hamburger Recycling Group GmbH  
• MEZDRA, Municipality of Mezdra
• MIHAI VITEAZU, Unitatea administrativ teritoriala Mihai vitezu, judetul Cluj
• PROPAKMA, PROPAKMA GmbH
• PTS, Papiertechnische Stigung
• SAICA, Sociedad Anónima Industrias Celulosa Aragonesa
• SFANTU GHEORGE, Municipiul Sfantugheorge
• STORA ENSO, Municipality of Dupnitsa
• TEGA, S.C. Municipality of Mezdra
• Trivalis

* ACR+ member

ACTIVITIES

ACR+ had the responsibility of providing an inventory of good practices related to bio-waste prevention inside and outside the partnership. On this basis, the partners implemented demonstration actions to concretely reduce bio-waste in their area. The inventory report includes 10 fact sheets covering the following issues:

1. Home composting - Italy (Piemonte)
2. Home composting - UK (Kent)
3. Home composting - Portugal (LIPOR)
4. Home composting - France (Chambery)
5. Community composting - Flanders
6. Community composting - Switzerland (Zürich)
7. Farm proximity composting - Austria (Freistadt)
8. Fight against food waste - UK (WRAP)
9. Closed Loop gardening - Flanders
10. Reuse centers - Flanders

ACR+ was also in charge of information dissemination through a project newsletter, articles and regular mailing to partner’s contact and acted as webmaster for the Miniwaste website, in collaboration with the project leader. This website provided news and up-to-date information about the project and the partners, about which anyone interested can leave a comment: it is a collaborative process where every stakeholder can have his word.

PARTNERS INVOLVED

Miniwaste's project project partners were:

• ACR+
• City of Brno (CZ)
• Lipor*
• Irstea
• Rennes Métropole*

* ACR+ member

PROJECT RESULTS

Implementation of demonstrative projects in Rennes Metropole, Porto region and Brno

Rennes Metropole, Lipor and Brno have developed comprehensive strategies to reduce bio-waste at source on their territories. These strategies cover in particular the distribution of individual composter bins to citizens, the promotion and support of collective composting sites (in household buildings, schools, etc.), and the development and running of composting demonstration sites.

They also implemented a series of promotion and training activities for composting at home (individual and collective housing) and on-site (schools, cafeterias and restaurants, catering services, etc.). The three cities/region also supported networks of composting guides and assistants, who will be able to promote composting and train citizens on how to compost.

Other activities at pilot (test) or large scale included in particular indoor composting with witness households weighing their bio-waste and fight against food waste in restaurants and schools.

Development and implementation of waste prevention process and monitoring computerized tool

In order to provide cities and regions with good practices related to (bio)waste reduction, ACR+ carried out a compilation of ten good practices extensively described in terms of process, success factors and challenges.

In parallel, Irstea developed three kinds of monitoring procedures (protocols) on the basis of research performed in the field and in the lab: assessment of the effect of composting on waste quantity, assessment of composters used for community composting and assessment of compost quality. Regarding the assessment of the effect of composting on waste quantity, the assessment tools are surveys, waste characterization (using the French MODECOM procedure), waste weighing by households and (electronic) green waste quantification. The assessment of composters used for collective composting depends on several factors, such as the type of bio-waste (green or kitchen waste), the frequency of deposits, etc. Regarding the assessment of compost quality, the methods are sensorial analysis (survey filled in by composters) and physic-chemical analysis (in lab).

On the basis of the inventory of good practices and the protocols, a web tool was developed and tested in 2012 in order to help cities and regions to assess and monitor the efficiency of bio-waste prevention strategies implemented on their territory. Rennes Metropole was in charge of developing this web tool, which is structured in 3 modules:

• Decision-making module (before any action or strategy is implemented), helping to make a territorial diagnosis and consult appropriate preventive actions;
• Actions monitoring module, helping to implement and follow-up bio-waste prevention actions;
• Result consultation module, presenting the results of the actions under the format of general or specific graphs and charts.

Communication and dissemination activities on Miniwaste

A set of communication tools was elaborated (Miniwaste website, leaflet, newsletter, etc.) in order to support dissemination of Miniwaste findings and results.

The various partners have developed various communication tools (poster campaign, flyers, video interviews, local websites etc.) and awareness-raising actions (conferences, demonstrations during local events, etc.) that have proven to be quite successful. This awareness-raising material has been distributed to citizens when delivering compost bins and during the local events. Other activities included emailing, video, Facebook, etc.

In order to disseminate the Miniwaste results at European scale, ACR+ has acted as communication manager, in particular regarding general communication and dissemination activities, like updating the Miniwaste website, drafting and issuing the newsletter and presenting the project at several events like the Green Week.

EVENTS

Miniwaste Final Conference in Rennes (FR), 20-21/11/2012

The Miniwaste final conference took place during the European Week for Waste Reduction. This one-and-a-half-day event held in French and English exhibited the results of the project and highlight efficient bio-waste prevention tools and strategies for cities and regions.

Plenary sessions gave bio-waste experts, public authorities and the European Commission the opportunity to get an overview of the Miniwaste partners’ bio-waste minimisation initatives and allowed them to discuss various bio-waste management strategies, from waste prevention solutions to centralised bio-waste management.

Workshops in French and English offered smaller groups in-depth training in four topics related to bio-waste prevention: composting, kitchen waste, garden waste, and using the protocols and monitoring tools developed as part of the Miniwaste project.

During the conference, participants also had the opportunity to test the computerised monitoring tool for bio-waste prevention activities.

The press release of the final conference is available here.

Brno Conference on bio-waste prevention, 13/09/2011

Taking place at the mid-term of the Miniwaste project, this event gave the opportunity to share experience on bio-waste prevention achievements in Europe, and especially in Brno, Rennes and Porto region. Experiments in different contexts were presented and analyzed for use by other initiatives or for advice. In particular, the Miniwaste partners shared their expertise on problems encountered, solutions and benefits that have been learned regarding the development of composting sites, training sessions for citizens and assistance to composting masters, etc.

Moreover, the event was the occasion to present the functionalities of the web tool aimed at helping local and regional authorities to implement bio-waste prevention actions, to be released at the end of the project.

The conference gave also the opportunity to share ideas and expertise on bio-waste prevention with other actors and projects in Europe. In particular, experts presented activities implemented in the framework of Pre-waste, Green Cook and the European Week for Waste Reduction.

The audience was in particular local and regional authorities, but other actors involved in the field of waste reduction were present as well.

This conference was organised by the City of Brno with the support of ACR+ and was held in Brno in Czech and English.

TOOLBOX

General documents

• Miniwaste Guidance document
• Inventory of good practices on bio-waste prevention
• Numerical assessment of project results

Protocols

• Compost Quality Assesment
• Quantifying the amount of communally composted organic waste
• Quantifying the amount of organic waste composted in individual homes