Thriving with Purpose: Moving Towards a Circular Economy in 2021

By Gary Tierney

Behind all our efforts to build a more sustainable economy lies a stark and unavoidable reality. We waste too much for our current economic models to ever be sustainable. In Ireland, we produce more than 13 million tonnes of waste every year. According to data from Eurostat, we are also producing the highest volume of plastic waste per person in the EU whilst  having one of the lowest recycling rates. 

Moving Towards a Circular Economy in 2021

This is an issue we can’t ignore. Ireland’s throwaway culture led to a waste generation of 54 kilos per capita in 2018, significantly higher than the EU average of 33 kilos. If we continue in this business as usual fashion, by 2050 it is estimated that the world will need the equivalent of three planet earths to meet resource demands. 

To combat this, the Government recently launched the Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy, a new national waste policy that will inform waste planning and management to help us realise a zero-waste future. 

The Action Plan will require us to move beyond simply managing waste, to a point where we question our use of resources and materials, we reconsider sustainability in the product design process, and we consider how to extend the productive life of the goods and products that we use.

Out with the old and in with the new

Ireland’s waste policy has tended to focus on how we treat the waste we produce and how to achieve the right balance between waste recycling, recovery, and disposal. However, a key objective of this Action Plan is to shift the focus of waste management back up the product life cycle chain in order to remove or design out harmful waste, extend the life of the products and goods we use, and prevent waste from arising in the first place.

To meet the requirements of the Action Plan a stringent balancing of powers across regulatory bodies, the waste collection industry, and their end-users is required. Every sector, every business, and every organisation has a role to play in effecting the transition to a circular economy. 

For businesses specifically, the traditional linear “take, make, dispose” production model will no longer be viable. To build a truly circular economy, businesses must find a way to use less, waste less, and recycle more. 

Only a circular economy can deliver true sustainability 

In a circular economy, businesses must aim to ensure that every process is as efficient as possible. At HP, the strategy to build a circular economy involves three key principles – repair, reuse, recycle. These principles can be traced back to 1992 when HP launched its Design for Sustainability programme. 

For every unit of output — whether a physical product or a service — inputs (such as physical materials or energy) are kept to a minimum. Similarly, when a product reaches the end of its useful life, it is broken down and recycled in a way that keeps as much material out of landfill as possible. 

A vital part of this effort is to reimagine product design. For us, sustainability is built into the design process. From the moment our product teams sit down to draw the first sketch, they think about the amount of energy and raw materials required to make, run, and then dispose of that product, as well as how much material as possible can be recycled.

Another key element is the creation of new business models and the reform of supply chains. By switching to contractual ‘as a service’ models rather than transactional models, businesses can work more closely with customers to ensure that products are kept out of landfills. Following this model, HP has repaired and reused over 4.6 million hardware units and recycled 528,300 tonnes of hardware and printing supplies – with a goal to recycle 1.2 million tonnes by 2025. 

Together, we already have the tools we need 

Many of the tools we need to build the circular economy are readily available to us. And many businesses are already harnessing them to make their own supply chains more sustainable. However, it’s not enough for businesses to simply adopt these tools and practices themselves. It’s crucial for companies to collaborate with partners across the entire supply chain. 

HP, for instance, in 2018 joined the initiative NextWave Plastics, to help to create the first global network of ocean-bound plastics supply chain. As part of this commitment, we invested $2 million to build a ‘washing line’ in Haiti – which was successfully completed in 2020, despite the huge challenges presented by Covid-19. The facility takes waste plastic collected on Haiti’s beaches, washes it, and makes it ready to be turned into HP products and supplies. 

While the Action Plan has provided an incentive for businesses to do more by wasting less, consumers have also embraced the role they play in driving the circular economy. More and more tech users are making purchasing decisions based on their principles just as much as the products and services presented to them. 

With environmental impact now a key buying factor, it is imperative that companies urgently rethink their business models if they haven’t started doing so. Embracing a circular economy is not just crucial for a company’s bottom-line, it is critical for securing the future of our planet and our communities – which is a purpose every single one of us must embrace in 2021, and beyond, in order to thrive.

Gary Tierney

Gary Tierney leads the HP Print Category Business for the UK and Ireland, where he is responsible for managing activities across hardware, supplies and solutions. He is also Managing Director for HP Ireland, where he drives the overall strategic direction of the business. Gary started working for HP Ireland in 1989.

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