Demonstrators for clusters of social circular enterprises (IA)

Expected Outcome

Social Circular Enterprises (SCEs)[1] need to adapt to new market realities in the circular economy, driven by the search for new market opportunities (e.g. secondary raw materials market, business models addressing change in consumption awareness, and technological developments improving productivity). To achieve this adaptation, investment in R&D capacity and technology for SCEs is essential. Besides further developing its offer towards consumers, SCEs are increasingly focussing their activities towards B2B markets, such as for secondary raw materials. In that regard, SCEs started to explore the growing and labour-intensive market of sorting, recycling and upcycling services for other businesses. Research and innovation can accelerate this potential and is most needed in the area to remain competitive. Moreover, research and innovation in this sector can lever potentials beyond productivity and competitiveness, as SCEs pursue a triple impact: economic, green (contribute to a circular and resource efficient economy) and social (employment of vulnerable groups).

The following outcomes are expected for SCEs and wider circular networks:

• Improve the uptake and scale of technology solutions in individual SCE and promote shared technology development and engineering through SCE clusters.
• Improve competitiveness through enhanced productivity, as well as new market opportunities, for SCEs related to specific waste streams with potential for competitive advantages, such as, textiles, WEEE (waste electrical and electronic equipment) and construction materials;
• Prove technical, economic, and environmental excellence of SCE in (local) circular value chains (e.g. I-US) leading to increased collaboration with (mainstream / for profit) industrial partners;
• Contribute to the reduction of non-recyclable waste generated in the region/area of the cluster by contributing to the re-using and transforming waste, by-products, and side-streams into new/secondary resources of raw materials;
• Increase employment of persons with a distance to the labour market in SCE and improve their labour productivity, for example by using assistive technology in the work process and use of data (e.g. AI trained assessment and instructions).

Scope

Social Circular Enterprises (SCEs) have been pioneers in the circular economy since decades. They are active in all stages of the circular economy and deal with various waste stream. SCEs are also known to offer new and innovative circular business models and brining new circular services and products to the market. In the last decade SCE also entered the market of secondary raw materials by collecting and dissembling various products and goods. The majority of SCEs are SMEs and offer local employment opportunities to vulnerable groups (99%)[2]. On average, a circular social enterprise creates 70 jobs per 1,000 tons collected with a view of being re-used.

Projects are expected to research and develop a replicable tech-oriented demonstrator(s) within social circular clusters. Within a demonstrator, partners are expected to jointly adapt, design, test and implement relevant technology solutions. The following specific activities are expected within demonstrators:

• The demonstrators are supposed to organise as a Social Circular Tech Cluster allowing to pool resources and adapt, develop and test technology solutions. This will facilitate more business opportunities (tech based spin-offs) and sharing of expertise with relevant industries.
• A demonstrator consortium should be active in at least two Member States or Associated Countries and can choose to focus on textile and construction waste or WEEE. Each demonstrator consortium exists out of two or more clusters, each grouping individual SCEs (ideally with different degrees of maturity[3]), for-profit circular companies (e.g. sectoral peers in secondary raw materials industries), research, and tech centres able to support SCE with relevant technology and research capacity. SCEs should form the core of the consortia, and should benefit directly from the interventions to improve their triple impact model. Public authorities and SCE federations could engage where appropriate. Demonstrator consortia should to be transnational in order to compare pilots in different markets.
• Adapting, designing and developing technologies in SCEs needs should focus on optimising efficiency[4] in management and processing of waste streams and enlarge the potential market activity of SCEs in the circular economy (WEEE, textiles and construction focus). Relevant technologies should improve the productivity and innovation capacity within SCE and consequently the market position in the secondary raw materials markets. Technologies can include data driven technologies such as AI to improve sorting knowledge and decision making (screening based on automated recognition with cost-benefit analysis), software to standardise repair operations and instructions, improve stocks management and increase reuse sales by optimising the pricing system (e.g. automated value calculation of incoming materials and goods), digital modelling tools (including material passport), etc.
• Research could also include the potential of assistive technologies to support employees (mostly persons with disabilities, specific impairments, or social disadvantages) in SCE in order to improve their productivity and wellbeing.
• Market research focussing on improving the position of SCE as an attractive partner in management and processing of waste streams (in terms of textile, WEEE and construction materials) with most potential for growth in B2B markets. For example focussing on collection, disassembly, sorting, purification, concentration, recycling, exchanging or preparation, for the valorisation of waste to be used as feedstock for other plants and companies across sectors and/or across value chains. This market research can include specific sectoral assessment of economic potential for most labour-intensive circular activities.
• By organising through clusters, demonstrators are motivated to develop shared engineering activities (labs, strategies and shared technology) to make technology accessible for enterprises with less capacity and resources and to reduce overall costs for individual SCEs.
• Where relevant, proposals are encouraged to build on, or seek collaboration with, existing projects and develop synergies with other relevant European, national or regional initiatives and funding programmes. In particular, the project could build further on relevant knowledge, tools, methods and technology developed and applied within existing H4C (Clusters for Circularity) and its knowledge platform.[5]

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Activities are expected to achieve TRL 6-7 by the end of the project – see General Annex B.

[1] https://circulareconomy.europa.eu/platform/sites/default/files/social_circular_economy_2017.pdf

[2] Proximity and social economy industrial ecosystem. Annual Single Market Report 2021.

[3] https://social-economy-gateway.ec.europa.eu/about-social-economy_en

[4] https://rreuse.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/d7--findings-and-evaluation-report-01.-digital-and-social-trends-in-re-use-operations-.pdf

[5] https://www.h4c-community.eu/