Global Circular Economy Scenario in a Multiregional Input-Output Framework.

In a resource-constrained world of an estimated 10 billion people in 2050 with the same material aspirations of today's high-income nations, there is no question: The future economy will need to be circular. From a policy perspective, the question is whether averting catastrophic environmental impacts through an accelerated transition to a global circular economy can also deliver sustained growth and jobs. The adoption of circular economy measures will have a range of effects on both domestic and foreign supply chains. Multiregional input-output (MRIO) analysis models the interdependencies between industries and within and between countries as well as between intermediate and final goods producers and consumers. It provides a useful toolbox for assessing social, environmental, and economy-wide impacts of the adoption of the circular economy. We project the MRIO database EXIOBASE to 2030 on the basis of the exogenously given parameters of the International Energy Agency's Energy Technology Perspective (IEA ETP) 6-degree scenario. We compare this business-as-usual (BAU) scenario and an alternative circular economy scenario. The circular economy scenario considers more recycling, reducing (material efficiency increase), repair, and reuse in relation to the BAU scenario. The adoption of circular economy measures has diverse impacts on the economy and environmental pressures. Global material extraction is reduced by about 10% compared to the baseline, while the impact on employment is small but positive. In particular, the shift from resource extracting sectors to the service sector will provide more opportunities for high-skilled and female workers.

[1]  G. G. Stokes.  "J." , 1890, The New Yale Book of Quotations.

[2]  W. Leontief.  Environmental Repercussions and the Economic Structure: An Input-Output Approach , 1970 .

[3]  Wassily Leontief,et al.  The Future of the World Economy: A United Nations Study , 1977 .

[4]  Law for the Promotion of Effective Utilization of Resources The Law for Promotion of Effective Utilization of Resources , 2001 .

[5]  Shinichiro Nakamura,et al.  Input‐Output Analysis of Waste Management , 2002 .

[6]  A. Tukker.  Eight types of product–service system: eight ways to sustainability? Experiences from SusProNet , 2004 .

[7]  M. Wagner.  The Porter Hypothesis Revisited: A Literature Review of Theoretical Models and Empirical Tests , 2004 .

[8]  Bernd Meyer,et al.  Endogenous technological change and emissions: the case of the German steel industry , 2005 .

[9]  K. Kratena.  Prices and factor demand in an endogenized input–output model , 2005 .

[10]  A. Washizu,et al.  An Analysis of Sustainable Consumption by the Waste Input‐Output Model , 2005 .

[11]  Shinichiro Nakamura,et al.  Waste input-output material flow analysis of metals in the Japanese economy , 2005 .

[12]  J. Bi,et al.  The Circular Economy: A New Development Strategy in China , 2006 .

[13]  D. Szyld,et al.  A DYNAMIC INPUT‐OUTPUT MODEL WITH ASSURED POSITIVE OUTPUT(*) , 2006 .

[14]  Peter D. Blair,et al.  Input-Output Analysis , 2009 .

[15]  Shinichiro Nakamura,et al.  Analyzing Polyvinyl Chloride in Japan With the Waste Input−Output Material Flow Analysis Model , 2009 .

[16]  Manfred Lenzen,et al.  A Material History of Australia , 2009 .

[17]  S. Levine,et al.  SECTORS MAY USE MULTIPLE TECHNOLOGIES SIMULTANEOUSLY: THE RECTANGULAR CHOICE-OF-TECHNOLOGY MODEL WITH BINDING FACTOR CONSTRAINTS , 2011 .

[18]  S. Giljum,et al.  Materials embodied in international trade – Global material extraction and consumption between 1995 and 2005 , 2012 .

[19]  Stefan Giljum,et al.  Carbon and Materials Embodied in the International Trade of Emerging Economies , 2012 .

[20]  Stefan Pauliuk,et al.  Steel all over the world: Estimating in-use stocks of iron for 200 countries , 2013 .

[21]  T. Graedel,et al.  Dynamic analysis of the global metals flows and stocks in electricity generation technologies , 2013 .

[22]  Arnold Tukker,et al.  Global Sustainability Accounting—Developing EXIOBASE for Multi-Regional Footprint Analysis , 2014 .

[23]  Manfred Lenzen,et al.  A Supply‐Use Approach to Waste Input‐Output Analysis , 2014 .

[24]  Tarja Häkkinen,et al.  Material Efficiency of Building Construction , 2014 .

[25]  Shigemi Kagawa,et al.  MaTrace: tracing the fate of materials over time and across products in open-loop recycling. , 2014, Environmental science & technology.

[26]  F. Duchin.  Resources, Production and Structural Dynamics: The transformative potential of input–output economics for addressing critical resource challenges of the twenty-first century , 2015 .

[27]  Richard Wood,et al.  Effect of aggregation and disaggregation on embodied material use of products in input–output analysis , 2015 .

[28]  Richard Wood,et al.  Labor Embodied in Trade , 2015 .

[29]  F. Krausmann,et al.  How Circular is the Global Economy?: An Assessment of Material Flows, Waste Production, and Recycling in the European Union and the World in 2005 , 2015 .

[30]  E. Hertwich,et al.  Dynamic Models of Fixed Capital Stocks and Their Application in Industrial Ecology , 2015 .

[31]  Arnold Tukker,et al.  Environmental and resource footprints in a global context: Europe’s structural deficit in resource endowments , 2016 .

[32]  S. Sanders.  Pushing the boundaries of scientific research: 120 years of addressing global issues , 2016, Science.

[33]  Arnold Tukker,et al.  Identifying priority areas for European resource policies: a MRIO-based material footprint assessment , 2016 .

[34]  Kirsten S. Wiebe,et al.  The impact of renewable energy diffusion on European consumption-based emissions† , 2016 .

[35]  Kirsten S. Wiebe,et al.  Endogenous technological change and the policy mix in renewable power generation , 2016 .

[36]  ThE CirCUlAr,et al.  EU Action Plan for the Circular Economy , 2016 .

[37]  Anthony Halog,et al.  Towards a Circular Economy in Australian Agri‐food Industry: An Application of Input‐Output Oriented Approaches for Analyzing Resource Efficiency and Competitiveness Potential , 2016 .

[38]  Manfred Lenzen,et al.  An Australian Multi‐Regional Waste Supply‐Use Framework , 2016 .

[39]  E. Hertwich,et al.  Scarcity-weighted global land and metal footprints , 2017 .

[40]  Geoffrey P. Hammond,et al.  Thermodynamic insights and assessment of the 'circular economy' , 2017 .

[41]  B. McLellan,et al.  Global Energy-mineral Nexus by Systems Analysis Approaches☆ , 2017 .

[42]  Claas Henning Wilts,et al.  Towards a circular economy : waste management in the EU ; study , 2017 .

[43]  T. Graedel,et al.  Anthropogenic nickel supply, demand, and associated energy and water use , 2017 .

[44]  S. Pauliuk,et al.  Solid Waste and the Circular Economy: A Global Analysis of Waste Treatment and Waste Footprints , 2017 .

[45]  E. Hertwich,et al.  Environmental Impacts of Capital Formation , 2018 .

[46]  Richard Wood,et al.  Endogenizing Capital in MRIO Models: The Implications for Consumption-Based Accounting. , 2018, Environmental science & technology.

[47]  Sarah Schmidt,et al.  EXIOBASE 3: Developing a Time Series of Detailed Environmentally Extended Multi‐Regional Input‐Output Tables , 2018 .

[48]  R. Kleijn,et al.  Metal supply constraints for a low-carbon economy? , 2018 .

[49]  Jannick Højrup Schmidt,et al.  Methodology for the Construction of Global Multi‐Regional Hybrid Supply and Use Tables for the EXIOBASE v3 Database , 2018 .

[50]  Arnold Tukker,et al.  Assessing circularity interventions: a review of EEIOA-based studies , 2018, Journal of Economic Structures.

[51]  Arnold Tukker,et al.  Growth in Environmental Footprints and Environmental Impacts Embodied in Trade: Resource Efficiency Indicators from EXIOBASE3 , 2018 .

[52]  J. Giesekam,et al.  Bridging the climate mitigation gap with economy‐wide material productivity , 2018, Journal of Industrial Ecology.

[53]  Richard Wood,et al.  Implementing exogenous scenarios in a global MRIO model for the estimation of future environmental footprints , 2018, Journal of Economic Structures.

[54]  Bin Chen,et al.  Consumption-based greenhouse gas emissions accounting with capital stock change highlights dynamics of fast-developing countries , 2018, Nature Communications.

[55]  Haijia Shi,et al.  Efforts for a Circular Economy in China: A Comprehensive Review of Policies , 2019 .

[56]  Hung‐Suck Park,et al.  Scaling‐Up of Industrial Symbiosis in the Korean National Eco‐Industrial Park Program: Examining Its Evolution over the 10 Years between 2005–2014 , 2019 .