Economies of Recycling, ‘Consumption Work’ and Divisions of Labour in Sweden and England

The recycling of domestic waste has become increasingly significant over recent years with governments across the world pledging increases in their recycling rates. But success in reaching targets relies on the input and effort of the household and consumer. This article argues that the work consumers regularly perform in sorting their recyclable waste into different fractions and, in some cases, transporting this to communal sites, plays an integral role in the overall division of labour within waste management processes. We develop the concept of ‘consumption work’ drawing on comparative research in Sweden and England to show how the consumer is both at the end and starting point of a circular global economy of materials re-use. The work that consumers do has not been systematically explored as a distinctive form of labour, and we argue that treating it seriously requires revision of the conventional approach to the division of labour

Method to identify opportunities for CCU at regional level — Matching sources and receivers

Carbon Capture and Utilization is an attractive strategy not only due to its potential for CO2 emissions reduction but also because it enables the creation of valuable products. The development of CO2-based industrial symbiosis partnerships can contribute significantly towards achieving the goals of GHG emissions reduction on a European level by 2030, while at the same time it leads to an increased added value through the development of new production lines and carbon neutral products. The presented article focuses on identifying potential partnerships between companies that produce CO2 and companies that may reuse CO2 as input for their industrial process. A novel methodological framework is presented based on developing generic matrices for CO2 sources and receivers and matching the industrial units based on geographical and technical criteria. Moreover, the paper provides the technical requirements of 17 CO2 utilization technologies with relatively high technology readiness level, including the CO2-to-product ratio, the required purity, pressure, temperature and the presence of a catalyst, as well as potential synergies and additional requirements. The methodology has been applied to the Västra Götaland region in West Sweden and the most promising CCU symbiosis have been identified. These include mineral carbonation (annual uptake: 59,600 tCO2), greenhouses (26,000 tCO2), algae production, methanol production (85,500 tCO2), power to gas (66,500 tCO2), pH control, lignin production, polymers synthesis and concrete curing (96,000 tCO2). If all of them could be applied, the total annual CO2 reduction would exceed 250,000 tCO2 per year

Infrastructures, Lock-in, and Sustainable Urban Development – The Case of Waste Incineration in the Göteborg Metropolitan Areas

This article explains how infrastructures with a sustainability record may evolve over time into a lock-in that slows the emergence of more sustainable urban infrastructures. A study of waste incineration in the Göteborg Metropolitan Area, Sweden, serves as an illustrative case. Taking leads from Unruh (2000; 2002), four rationales of lock-in are identified in the case: institutional, technical, cultural, and material. The article describes how these rationales, one by one and in collaboration, lock-in waste handling in the Göteborg Metropolitan Area to incineration. The article also suggests that these four rationales could serve as a program to unlock urban infrastructures. Asking the question “Are we in a lock-in?” is featured as a practical starting point for planning changes in urban infrastructure governance that contribute to sustainability.A revised version of this paper is published in Journal of Cleaner Production, Volume 50, 1 July 2013, Pages 32–3