Circular Economy in China

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Circular Economy in China Circular Economy in China

Guo Jianli

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Circular Economy in China

• 1. The problems we are facing.

• 2. What’s circular economy?

• 3. The main issues of establishing circular economy.

• 4. What are we doing now?

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Circular Economy in China

-The problems we are facing.

• Resources shortage

• Environmental crisis

• Pressure from the economical development and the keep-increasing population

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-The problems we are facing.

• Resources shortage:

T he Percentage of Domestic Supply of the Main Ores (%)

0 50 100 150 200

1990 1991

1992 1993

1994 1995

1996 1997

1998 1999

2000 2001

2002 Year

Percentage(%) _{Zinc Ore}

Crude Oil Iron Ore Alumina Copper Ore

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-The problems we are facing.

• Resources shortage:

the Change of The Area of Tillable Fields in China

18.4 18.6 18.8 19 19.2 19.4 19.6

1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 year

the area of tillabe field (0.1 billion mu)

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-The problems we are facing

• Environmental Crisis

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-The problems we are facing

• Pressure from the economical development and the keep-increasing population, in 2020,

– The GDP is predicted to be >4,000 billion $;

– The population will reach about 1.47 billion.

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-The problems we are facing

• So that we should:

Using the Limited Resources to Meet the Demand of the Development

And circular economy is a possible way.

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Circular Economy in China

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-What’s circular economy?

One-way

Linear economy

“Mass-production, mass-consumption and mass-disposal”

Circular economy

“Closed Materials Cycle” -based

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-What’s circular economy?

The main merits:

– To abate the extraction from nature – To dramatically reduce the wastes

The limitations:

– Most of the materials can’t be recycled

– Cost (Recycling is a energy-consuming and labor-consuming process)

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-What’s circular economy?

• Then, is there any other way?

Sure!

Maybe it is:

• To put nature (or other planet) into the cycle

• Etc…

Circular Economy might be far from the best way, however, it’s a possible way towards a sustainable future.

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Circular Economy in China

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Main issues about circular economy

• Issue 1: What does the material basis of our economy look like?

• Issue 2: How to make the materials closed?

• Issue 3: What are the side effects of circular economy?

• Issue 4: How to turn those ideas into practice?

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Issue 1: the material basis (only inputs and outputs)

Hidden Flows Hidden Flows

Stocks

Domestic Environment Processing

Domestic Extraction

Domestic Processed Outputs DPO (to Air, Land, and Water) Hidden Flows

Imports Exports

Add. Air and Water

Water Vapour

DMI TMR

TDO

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• Issue 2: How to close?

Some basic theories of closing the material cycle:

– Eco-efficiency (For enterprises) – Industrial Ecology (For Industries)

– Waste Resource Utilization (For whole society)

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• Issue 3: Side effects of circular economy

– Decreasing the diversity (Efficiency is harmful to the diversity)

– Hampering innovation – Else….

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• Issue 4: How to realize?

– Government: constitute laws and regulations, Green Purchase…;

– Industries: clean production, industrial ecology, …;

– Citizens: use the products longer, actively participate in the reclaim process;

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Circular Economy in China

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- What are we doing?

We have done some initiative work to establish circular economy, which mainly are:

– Research work

– Laws and regulations – Demonstration

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- What are we doing?

Research work

– Basic theories of circular economy – Material flow study

– Relevant technologies

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- What are we doing?

Laws and Regulations

– The Law for Clean Production

–– The Law for Waste RecyclingThe Law for Waste Recycling (under constitution, mainly about the home appliances and used cars)

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- What are we doing?

Demonstration Projects:

– Demonstration province/ city of Circular Economy: Liaoning Province and Guiyang City;

– about 10 Eco-industrial Parks

– Clean Productions among some enterprises

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- What are we doing?

There remains a long way

for us to go ahead……

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Thanks a lot!

Any recommendation or question is appreciated!