The final day of our study tour focused on the circular economy.
In April 2020 Amsterdam became the first municipality in the world to publish a City Doughnut - a vision to emerge from COVID-19 as a city that ensures a good life for everyone, within the Earth’s natural boundaries. The vision is to transition Amsterdam into a circular city, adopting a smarter approach to managing scarce raw materials, production and consumption, and creating more jobs for everyone.
Why is it called a doughnut? It’s inspired by a 2012 Oxfam report by Kate Raworth. This was later developed in her book Doughnut Economics: seven ways to think like a 21st century economist.
In keeping with the theme today’s venue was the impressive Circl which is shaped like a doughnut and is the centre of a movement to spread circular economy principles. Accordingly they start at the end. Yes, they cook with what's leftover. Stale bread, leftover fruit and veg from supermarkets. Chefs adhere to circular principles and fight against food waste every day. They use sustainable cooking techniques such as preserving and fermenting in the kitchen.
The building itself is pretty impressive. Built around circularity principles, it reuses the fabric of company uniforms as heat and sound insulation; and you only get your coffee if you learn sign language to communicate with a deaf Ukrainian refugee. (I learned capuccino - the easiest).
What’s clear for me is the ambition being displayed in places like this go way beyond the minimum standard/box ticking approach to ‘sustainability’ we have in much of the UK. Paradigm shift is when a big chunk of a community swaps their old conceptions for new ones. That’s what is happening here.
So we heard about demolition crews being reframed as urban miners. In their view Amsterdam (or any other town, city or estate) can be viewed as an urban mine with a wealth of metals such as aluminum, copper, gold and steel contained within its built environment. It is less costly to mine urban buildings and structures such as high-rise buildings for steel, cables for copper, window frames for aluminum and phones for gold. Nothing is ‘waste’.
So, Sultan Çetin spoke to us about the CHARM approach which is to optimise (re)use of material and natural resources and to demonstrate innovative approaches for housing renovation and asset management that prevent downcycling. The project also wants to secure adoption of these approaches within housing association partners, as well as to accelerate the adoption of such approaches throughout the social housing industry. CHARM building strategies will lead to 36% of materials being prevented from downcycling, compared to the current maximum of 10%.
The tour ended with a talk by Bas Boorsma, the Chief Digital Officer of Rotterdam, who introduced us to his ways of thinking that will help us make the system shift we need.
Embrace the network paradigm
Craft a shared language
Synthesise
Be inclusive
Prioritise citizen centered outcomes
Be honest – don’t drink your own Kool Aid
Keep friends close but your enemies closer
Educate, educate, educate
So how do we translate this to the UK, to the housing sector and , indeed, to Bromford. That’s the question we’ll seek to answer over the coming months.