The Circular Economy – benefit or burden?

The Circular Economy – Benefits and Beginnings
Understanding the Circular Economy, and practical ways to get started for your business.

Welcome to the Innovation Network’s fourth event of the 17/18 calendar.
This event explores what the Circular Economy means, the potential implications for traditional business models, and inspiration on how to get started.
Business leaders and governments are puzzling over how to meet the needs of 3 billion new consumers by 2030, against a backdrop of degraded land, climate disruption and over-exploited finite resources. Organisations in every sector are re-thinking their strategies to be future-fit – ‘business as usual’ is not sustainable.

The circular economy is gaining momentum in solving the issues created by our ‘traditional’ linear economy (take, make, use, dispose of… with waste and pollution at every stage). The World Economic Forum, European Union, China, and lots of multinational businesses are investing in circular strategies, seeing the potential for value creation, reduced risk and increased resilience.

Join us to find out how circular designs and strategies could benefit your business, with examples along the value chain including materials, products, processes and business models.

There will be an optional tour afterwards (3pm) of NPL’s laboratories.

Our events are for senior technologists and leaders in high tech manufacturing. The network members are an impressive peer group. With an emphasis on quality input, getting to know one’s peers, and sharing experience, events are rich in learning and serendipitous connections.

Important to achieving this is ensuring that those who attend our events fit the membership profile. Please read more about the Network here.

If you fit our profile (senior engineer, scientist, or leader in high tech manufacturing) and you are interested in becoming a member, we would love to welcome you to your first event free of charge.

Speakers
Ken Webster, Head of Innovation, The Ellen MacArthur Foundation

Ken has worked with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation since January 2010. He has a background in economics education and environmental issues. His latest book is The Circular Economy: A Wealth of Flows (June 2015) which relates the connections between systems thinking, economic and business opportunity and the potential for a circular economy. He is a Visiting Fellow at Cranfield University, an Honorary Teaching Fellow at the School of Management at the University of Bradford and a major contributor to their MBA Innovation, Enterprise and the Circular Economy.

Industry representatives

A growing number of organisations are embracing the principles of the Circular Economy and we will hear directly from three manufacturers about their experiences of doing so:

Stafford Lloyd, Sustainability and Systems Engineer as Riversimple.

Stafford is a specialist in the Circular Economy, hydrogen energy, critical raw materials and sustainable supply chains. He has a fascinating story to tell about Riversimple, a highly innovative hydrogen car company with a clear purpose to eliminate the environmental impact of personal transport.

Charles Symonds, Business Improvement and Sustainability Manager, the Stannah Group

Charles has a PhD in the improvement of product sustainability through whole life design methodologies. He will share the background behind the work at Stannah to introduce the principles of the CE and both the obstacles and opportunities they have encountered along the way.

Keith Freegard, Founder, Axion Recycling Ltd

Axion Recycling Ltd is one of the UK’s leading recycling businesses in the waste materials recovery industry. Keith has over 30 years of operational management experience gained in a variety of manufacturing environments, ranging from Factory Manager for Domestos liquid bleach with Unilever, to a start-up business for a novel biodegradable packaging product. As a Chartered Chemical Engineer and MBA, Keith believes in applying the best possible process-plant technology to extract maximum yield and value from mixed material waste streams. Over the last 15 years, he has led the development Axion’s unique End-of-Life vehicle recycling business in Manchester with a focus on sales and marketing of high-quality plastics, aggregates and alternative fuels made from recovered ELV & WEEE waste streams. He is Vice Chairman of the British Plastic Federation’s Recycling Group and a non-Executive Director of OPRL – the on-pack recycling label scheme for consumer packaging.

Timings
Arrival: 8.45 teas, coffees, pastries

Start: 9am prompt

Lunch: 12.45pm

End: 3pm

3pm: Optional tour of NPL’s laboratories, est 1 hr.

Location
We are kindly being hosted by NPL at Bushy House on their estate in Teddington.

Please drive straight to Bushy House using this postcode: TW11 0EB. There is plenty of parking at Bushy House.

FREE TO MEMBERS