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Soft measures and their relevance in the transition to circular economy-The case study of the Czech Republic
Abstract
To accelerate the transition to a circular economy, the European member states apply a broad range of policy instruments. Based on recycling rates and public participation on recycling efforts, the Czech Republic seems to be a country that is on the regular way to a circular economy. However, the environmental effect of policy instruments (e.g. P&E campaigns) is going to be exhausted as the recycling rates are not growing significantly anymore. Those, who are convinced recyclers, are recycling today. Nevertheless, how to motivate chronic non-recyclers to increase their public participation at recycling efforts is questionable. We focus on social norms and social environment to explain their recycling behaviour. Furthermore, the awareness about waste separation belongs to important variables that determine the way how non-recyclers proceed in their recycling efforts.
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While the terms Circular Economy and sustainability are increasingly gaining traction with academia, industry, and policymakers, the similarities and differences between both concepts remain ambiguous. The relationship between the concepts is not made explicit in literature, which is blurring their conceptual contours and constrains the efficacy of using the approaches in research and practice. This research addresses this gap and aims to provide conceptual clarity by distinguishing the terms and synthesising the different types of relationships between them. We conducted an extensive literature review, employing bibliometric analysis and snowballing techniques to investigate the state of the art in the field and synthesise the similarities, differences and relationships between both terms. We identified eight different relationship types in the literature and illustrated the most evident similarities and differences between both concepts.
The transition within business from a linear to a circular economy brings with it a range of practical challenges for companies. The following question is addressed: What are the product design and business model strategies for companies that want to move to a circular economy model? This paper develops a framework of strategies to guide designers and business strategists in the move from a linear to a circular economy. Building on Stahel, the terminology of slowing, closing, and narrowing resource loops is introduced. A list of product design strategies, business model strategies, and examples for key decision-makers in businesses is introduced, to facilitate the move to a circular economy. This framework also opens up a future research agenda for the circular economy.
In this study we report on a doorstepping intervention which produced a 12.5%, statistically significant, increase in the recycling capture rate. More importantly, we investigate why doorstepping caused the increase, through focus groups, structured interviews and questionnaires. By analyzing the findings with respect to a pragmatic set of eleven clusters of determinants of behaviour change, we find that social norms and emotion were important, with prompts as a more minor determinant. We can now plan further doorstepping knowing an emphasis on these is useful. Knowledge, skills, belief of consequences, belief of capability, action planning, role clarification, feedback, and motivation were determinant clusters found not to be important in this case. Recycling behaviour change interventions often do not generally produce transferable learning because they are usually presented as case studies and not broken down into key elements. Our analytical approach of breaking down a poorly defined activity - doorstepping - into elements which influence different clusters of determinants, and then exploring their separate impacts, allows some predictive planning and optimization for other interventions. The specific context here was residential food waste recycling in apartment blocks of communities in Shanghai, China.
Although kerbside recycling participation rates have been well studied, little consideration has been paid to dense housing, especially high-rise estates, even though such areas have particularly low participation rates. Because such areas present infrastructural difficulties for recyclates storage and collections, reduced service often results. Nevertheless, solutions still emphasise communication strategies and householder responsibility over adequate infrastructural provision. This paper draws together three empirically based analyses focusing on the improvement of waste collection procedures and infrastructural design for high- and low-rise dense housing. Two sites were studied: an inner London estate and Portsmouth. Both sites have minimal storage space either within the home or in external private, communal or public areas. Both areas have high churn rates. Analysis of the findings suggests that consideration needs to be given to several factors: social, architectural, technological, infrastructural and organisational. Communication strategies need to be simple and consistent and need to acknowledge non-Anglophone residents. Spatial ownership needs to be clearly demarcated and maintained. Solutions must be tailored to existing exigencies of the built environment (such as poor vehicular access) and need to include broader infrastructural factors such as functioning lifts and convenient, safe storage facilities. New-build is better placed to integrate a flexible collection infrastructure. However, pressure to increase housing density is providing a continuing challenge to design appropriate storage and collection infrastructures.
Despite the fact that all successful, documented cases of industrial symbiosis to this day have been self-organizing, some authors and development officials have suggested that increased public planning might deliver better results in this respect than spontaneously evolved market coordination. This paper takes an historical approach to suggest that comprehensive planning is unlikely to live up to the expectations of its proponents.The essay is structured as follows. The first section provides short case studies of industrial symbiosis in highly different economic and institutional settings, the essentially free-market regime of Victorian England and communist Hungary (1948–1989). The available evidence suggests that market coordination proved much more favorable to the emergence of industrial symbiosis, despite the elaboration of a comprehensive policy to that effect in Hungary. Insights derived from the so-called “Austrian” critique of central planning are then used to explain this paradox. The analysis presented suggests that the Hungarian planners’ failure was not so much the result of the bad implementation of sound policies, but the logical outcome of a top-down approach’s shortcomings. Policy implications for the public planning of industrial symbiosis in a mixed economy are then derived and the case for self-organization is found more compelling. The creation of more innovative institutions that will force firms to “internalize their externalities” while leaving them the necessary freedom to innovate is viewed as an urgently needed and promising path towards increased, sustainable reuse of industrial by-products.
Over the last several decades, sociologists have investigated the public's increasing concern about the environment, but they have had little success explaining attitudes toward the environment or the adoption of pro-environment behaviors like recycling. We examine the role of social context in the link between individual attitudes about the environment and recycling behavior by comparing communities that vary in their access to recycling programs. Results show that people with access to a structured recycling program have much higher levels of recycling than do people lacking such access. Furthermore, individual attitudes toward the environment affect recycling behavior only in the community with easy access to a structured recycling program. Individual concern about the environment enhances the effect of the recycling program, but does not overcome the barriers presented by lack of access.
Product design is one of the most important sectors influencing global sustainability, as almost all the products consumed by people are outputs of the product development process. In particular, early design decisions can have a very significant impact on sustainability. These decisions not only relate to material and manufacturing choices but have a far-reaching effect on the product's entire life cycle, including transportation, distribution, and end-of-life logistics. However, key challenges have to be overcome to enable eco-design methods to be applicable in early design stages. Lack of information models, semantic interoperability, methods to influence eco-design thinking in early stages, measurement science and uncertainty models in eco-decisions, and ability to balance business decisions and eco-design methodology are serious impediments to re-alizing sustainable products and services. Therefore, integrating downstream life cycle data into eco-design tools is essential to achieving true sustainable product development. Our review gives an overview of related research and positions early eco-design tools and decision support as a key strategy for the future. By merging sustainable thinking into traditional design methods, this review provides a framework for ongoing research, as well as encourages research collaborations among the various communities interested in sustainable product realization.
As sustainable waste management has become an important environmental concern, growing emphasis is being given to policy tools aimed at increasing recycling behavior by households. Information is a common policy tool, but may not always reach the individuals whose behavior is being targeted, i.e., those reluctant to recycle. This study examined individual differences in attention to recycling information and demand for such information. A nationwide survey in Sweden showed that having personal norms for recycling is important when it comes to obeying and seeking environmentally relevant information. In contrast to earlier research, this study found that lack of information alone is not a significant antecedent to the intention to seek information. Personal norms were found to moderate the effect of perceived lack of information on the intention to seek information.
In light of the growing attention that social norm interventions have garnered as policy tools, we review the current body of evidence on their effectiveness with respect to pro-environmental behaviors. We identify the various conceptualizations of social norms currently in use and inventory the experimental economics and social psychology literature that has examined the impacts of social norm interventions on pro-environmental behavior. For each study included in this inventory, we note several contextual features, the data collection and analytical methods used, and any significant main effects attributed to the social norm intervention. We also review several theoretical models of behavior that incorporate social norms. Based on this empirical and theoretical review, we draw a number of policy implications and identify avenues for future research on the role of social norms with respect to pro-environmental behavior.
The effects of two common systems of waste separation such as drop-off sites collection and kerbside collection, and the addition of an incentive program in small communities of the Czech Republic were investigated. Our findings suggest that the paper and plastics separation rates of total municipal solid waste are 7.7% for drop-off sites and 9.7% for kerbside collection system. If we add an incentive program, the separated paper and plastics rate can reach more than 17%, which represents a significant increase of the separation rate. Additionally, higher density of drop-off sites can also increase separation rate, but the effect is relatively low, and this approach is often not economical.
This paper proposes a new value-based indicator to assess the performance of actors in the supply chain in terms of resource efficiency and circular economy.
Most of the methodologies developed so far measure resource efficiency on the basis of the environmental burden of the resource relative to the value of output. However, the key point of circular economy is keeping resources within the economy when products no longer serve their functions so that materials can be used again and therefore generate more value.
The unit in which resource efficiency and circular economy are measured greatly affects both the ease of acceptance by policymakers and the direction in which green policy will change our society.
Whereas the most common approaches to assessing resource efficiency and circular economy use mass, in this paper we advocate measuring both resource efficiency and circular economy in terms of the market value of ‘stressed’ resources, since this value incorporates the elements of scarcity versus competition as well as taxes representing urgent social and environmental externalities. The market value of resources is well-documented and responds automatically to the locality and time at which resources are used.
Applying this unit, circularity is defined as the percentage of the value of stressed resources incorporated in a service or product that is returned after its end-of-life. Resource efficiency is the ratio of added product value divided by the value of stressed resources used in production or a process thereof. It is argued that precisely the concept of a free market, in which materials, parts and components are exchanged purely on the basis of their functionality and cost, allows the resource efficiency of a process (KPI for industry and governance) to be distinguished from the resource efficiency of a product (KPI for consumers and governance).
Using standard industry data from Statistics Netherlands, the resource efficiency of several Dutch industries were evaluated using the new methodology and compared with a traditional mass-based approach.
Since 1989, efforts to understand the nature of interfirm resource sharing in the form of industrial symbiosis and to replicate in a deliberate way what was largely self-organizing in Kalundborg, Denmark have followed many paths, some with much success and some with very little. This article provides a historical view of the motivations and means for pursuing industrial symbiosis - defined to include physical exchanges of materials, energy, water, and by-products among diversified clusters of firms. It finds that "uncovering" existing symbioses has led to more sustainable industrial development than attempts to design and build eco-industrial parks incorporating physical exchanges. By examining 15 proposed projects brought to national and international attention by the U.S. President's Council on Sustainable Development beginning in the early 1990s, and contrasting these with another 12 projects observed to share more elements of self-organization, recommendations are offered to stimulate the identification and uncovering of already existing "kernels" of symbiosis. In addition, policies and practices are suggested to identify early-stage precursors of potentially larger symbioses that can be nurtured and developed further. The article concludes that environmentally and economically desirable symbiotic exchanges are all around us and now we must shift our gaze to find and foster them. © 2007 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Yale University.
We provide a theoretical and empirical analysis of individual offset behavior, with environmental offsets as a specific form of voluntary public good provision. While existing theoretical models on the voluntary provision of public goods usually focus exclusively on single motivations for individual contributions, we explicitly account for various motivations in a unified framework, drawing on theories for public good provision such as pure and impure altruism, internalized norms and social approval. Such an approach is particularly useful when individual offset behavior is heterogeneous. The applicability of our theoretical framework is supported by data from a choice experiment on voluntary carbon offsetting in Switzerland and the USA. We find that willingness to pay for offsets mainly depends on an individual's internalized norms to avoid environmental degradation as well as partly on income. The probability to offset, instead, is better explained by an individual's expected social recognition for offsetting.
Municipal recycling rates are driven by a variety of factors. Yet how these factors influence recycling over time has not been thoroughly studied. We compile and analyze a panel dataset spanning 13-years of policy, program, and contextual (socioeconomic and demographic) variables for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. We find Pay-As-You-Throw (PAYT) to be the single most important factor influencing rates. In one time period, PAYT's effect varied by the type of recycling service (drop off, subscription, curbside) and increased recycling even more when paired with curbside pickup. Yet, across models, program designs that seek to make recycling more convenient, such as curbside pickup and single stream (the commingling of all recyclables in a single bin) are not as consistently beneficial as PAYT. Education level and median age are the most important contextual factors. Access to a Materials Recycling Facility is also an important driver of recycling rates. Our findings can inform municipal officials and waste managers as they seek to increase recycling.
Since the 1990s, Product Service Systems (PSS) have been heralded as one of the most effective instruments for moving society towards a resource-efficient, circular economy and creating a much-needed ‘resource revolution’. This paper reviews the literature on PSS in the last decade and compares the findings with those from an earlier review in this journal in 2006. Close to 300 relevant papers were identified, over 140 of which have been referenced in this review. Research in the field of PSS has become more prolific, with the output of refereed papers quadrupling since 2000, while on average scientific output has only doubled. PSS has also become embedded in a wider range of science fields (such as manufacturing, ICT, business management, and design) and geographical regions (Asia now produces more papers than Europe). The literature of the last seven years has refined insights with regard to the design of PSS, as well as their business and environmental benefits, and confirmed the definitions and PSS concepts already available in 2006. A major contribution of the recent literature is research into how firms have implemented PSS in their organization and what the key success factors and issues that require special attention are (such as a focus on product availability for clients; an emphasis on diversity in terms of services provided rather than the range of products; and the need for staff to possess both knowledge of the product and relationship management skills). The reasons why PSS have nonetheless still not been widely implemented, particularly in the B2C context, seem to have already been explained fairly well in the literature available in 2006. For consumers, having control over things, artifacts, and life itself is one of the most valued attributes. PSS are often less accessible, or have less intangible value, than the competing product, in part because PSS usually do not allow consumers as much behavioral freedom or even leave them with the impression that the PSS provider could prescribe how they should behave.
Comparisons were made between two groups of households in a multi-family residential area in order to investigate how oral information through a door-stepping campaign can influence household food waste recycling behaviour from a quantitative as well as qualitative perspective. Source-separation behaviour was assessed both through weakly weighting of all source-separated food waste and dry recyclables as well as residual waste generated over a period of 104 weeks, as well as repeated waste composition analyses. Introduction of source-separation of food waste for biogas production significantly decreased the generation of residual waste in the whole case-study area. An average generation of 0.72 and 0.71 kg, household−1, week−1 of separately collected food waste was found amongst households receiving and not contacted through the door-stepping campaign respectively. The difference between the groups was not statistically significant. Four waste composition analyses show that the average source-separation ratio of food waste was higher and the ratio of incorrectly sorter material lower in the food waste fraction amongst households where oral information had been provided. A decrease over time in the source-separation ratio of food waste amongst households receiving oral information suggests a low durability of the door-stepping campaign. No signs were seen of increased source-separation ratio or decreased ratio of incorrectly sorted material amongst dry recyclables. The study supports previous findings pointing at accessibility as a key factor for increased recycling behaviour. However, results also suggest that such systems must address convenience also in the household interior.
This study examines the effects of municipal promotion and education (P&E) investments on the recycling rates of recyclables found in Ontario's residential waste stream. Using panel data collected from 223 Ontario municipalities between 2003 and 2012, this study examines whether investments in recycling P&E lead to an increase in household recycling. Investments in recycling promotion and education have been characterized as a policy best practice and is promoted as one of the primary drivers of resource conservation and sustainability in Ontario. Focus is placed on analyzing: (a) the relationship between P&E expenditures and recycling rates in the province, (b) the relationship between municipal recycling rates and P&E investments at different funding levels and (c) the impact of locality on promotion and education efficacy. The results of the statistical regressions indicate that investments in recycling P&E do not increase municipal recycling rates, necessitating a re-evaluation of existing policy and management practices.
Two different strategies aiming at increasing household source-separation of food waste were assessed through a case-study in a Swedish residential area (a) use of written information, distributed as leaflets amongst households and (b) installation of equipment for source-segregation of waste with the aim of increasing convenience food waste sorting in kitchens. Weightings of separately collected food waste before and after distribution of written information suggest that this resulted in neither a significant increased amount of separately collected food waste, nor an increased source-separation ratio. After installation of sorting equipment in households, both the amount of separately collected food waste as well as the source-separation ratio increased vastly. Long-term monitoring shows that results where longstanding. Results emphasize the importance of convenience and existence of infrastructure necessary for source-segregation of waste as important factors for household waste recycling, but also highlight the need of addressing these aspects where waste is generated, i.e. already inside the household.
This paper examines our understanding of recycling behaviour in the context of its increasing normalisation in the UK. It reflects on the recent history of dry recycling (i.e. recycling of ‘dry’ materials such as paper, glass, plastics and cans) and asks the question as to what influence policy drivers and the increased provision of facilities for recycling have had on people's behaviour. In reviewing the evidence for recycling being considered a norm, this paper explores what influence norms, habit and identities have on recycling behaviour.
It then considers what lessons the evidence offers for using the normalisation of recycling behaviour in influencing more people to recycle and to adopt other sustainable behaviours. The somewhat contentious issue of whether engaging in recycling behaviours has a positive or negative effect on people engaging with other pro-environmental behaviours is discussed. The evidence shows that both positive and negative spillover occurs and understanding where the balance lies, as well as what effect recycling being a norm plays in this, is important in determining appropriate interventions to influence pro-environmental behaviours. The paper concludes with some observations on implications of the evidence on intervention approaches to influence pro-environmental behaviours.
This study examined the role of self-perceptions, within a theory of planned behavior (TPB) framework, in the prediction of householders’ recycling intentions and behavior. To examine additional self-perception constructs, the personality factor of conscientiousness (as well as its lower order facets) and measures of self-identity were assessed in addition to the standard TPB predictors of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control (PBC). Participants from the general community (N = 200) completed TPB, conscientiousness, and self-identity items. Two weeks later, 148 participants reported their recycling behavior for the previous fortnight. Structural equation modeling found some support for the standard TPB with attitude and subjective norm (but not PBC) predicting recycling intentions and intentions (but not PBC) predicting recycling behavior. In addition, self-identity as a recycler but not conscientiousness (or its lower order facets) emerged as a significant predictor of recycling intentions, although not as a significant determinant of actual recycling behavior. The findings of the present study highlight the importance of considering role-related perceptions in the development of prorecycling campaigns.
Three waste management behaviors (waste reduction, reuse, and recycling) were examined with the use of a conceptual framework developed by the author. It was posited that environmental values, situational characteristics, and psychological factors all play a significant role in the prediction of waste management behavior, within the context of a core intention-behavior relationship. The framework was tested in a self-report questionnaire of 673 residents of Exeter, UK. It was found that the predictors of reduction, reuse, and recycling behavior differed significantly, with reduction and reuse being predicted by underlying environmental values, knowledge, and concern-based variables. Recycling behavior was, in contrast, characterized as highly normative behavior. The use of the approach taken for investigating other environmental behaviors is examined.
A meta-analysis was made of results from previous studies on different variables influencing and determining the recycling behaviour of householders. These studies were conducted by researchers working in various fields in a number of different countries and are published in diverse journals. We evaluated trends in research outputs in the period 1990–2010, during which the provision of recycling facilities to householders has greatly expanded and requirements have become more extensive and often more complex. Variables affecting the recycling behaviour of householders were classified into four theoretical groups: socio-psychological, technical-organisational, individual socio-demographic and study-specific. These groups (clusters) were identified in a meta-analysis of 63 empirical studies culled from published research. The strongest predictors of householders’ recycling behaviour were identified as being convenience, moral norms, information and environmental concern. The theoretical framework developed can be used to formulate questionnaires and in data analysis.
We examine the role of social norms and warm-glow in a theoretical framework and establish that improving the quality of recycling facilities, for example through kerbside collection, will elicit more recycling effort if warm-glow is present. Drawing on the literature, we model the role of social norms with reference to age profile, ethnicity and geographical location of the reference group. Using English local authority data, we show that a social norm for recycling does exist. We find the expected relationship between the quality of kerbside provision and recycling activity, if the household derives warm-glow from the activity; however, it is insignificant. Amongst the control variables, we find evidence that multifamily dwellings recycle less.
According to the European regulation regarding waste management (which is reflected in the increasing pressure on municipal waste separation and recycling) the choice of suitable political instruments seems to be crucial. Based on scientific research, the variable charges are considered as an effective choice for the regulation. Unfortunately, scientific research is not followed by a local decision making process within the Czech Republic. One of the reasons discussed in this paper is the economy of variable charges and their influence on administrative costs and total costs of the municipal waste management system. There is no doubt that the effectiveness of variable charges is higher than by fixed fees, but the crucial question for local representatives is not the effectiveness but the economy of charges in the waste management.
Industrial symbioses (ISs) and eco-industrial parks (EIPs) are key concepts of industrial ecology (IE). The aim of ISs and EIPs is to minimise inefficient material and energy use by utilising local by-product and energy flows. Industrial symbioses tend to develop through spontaneous action of economic actors, for gaining of economic benefit, but these systems can be designed and promoted via policy instruments as well. A literature review showed that national programmes for eco-industrial parks can be found in different parts of the world. In the action programmes and other sustainable consumption and production (SCP) policy documents of the EU, on the other hand, industrial symbioses gain less recognition as a path to enhanced sustainable production. In this article, we consider this and also analyse how the evolution and environmental performance of an industrial symbiosis system centred on a Finnish pulp and paper mill have been affected by SCP policy instruments. With regard to the system forming the subject of the case study, and Finnish industrial systems in general, policy instruments have succeeded in reducing emissions but not in systematically encouraging operators toward symbiosis-like activities. All in all, few studies exist on the overall impact of policy instruments promoting design of eco-industrial parks. It is not self-evident that symbiosis-like production systems would be sustainable in every case, as the background assumptions for political promotion of EIPs suggest. We concluded that industrial symbioses should be analysed and developed on a life cycle basis, with documentation of the real environmental benefits due to efficient resource use and decreased emissions in comparison to standalone production. ISs can then bring eco-competitiveness to companies in relation to SCP tools, such as environmental permits, ecolabels, and future product regulation based on the Ecodesign Directive in Europe. Indirect encouragement of symbiosis through land-use regulation and planning, in such a way that material fluxes between companies are possible both in operations and in financial terms, may prove effective. The same holds for waste policies that encourage increased reuse of a company’s waste by other enterprises.
This study compared the influence of individualistic attitudinal factors with more community-level (or ecological) variables on recycling behavior in the context of Belfast, Northern Ireland. Data obtained from a postal questionnaire (n = 765) were matched with historical recycling participation behavior data collected by the local government authority to examine the effect of general environmental concern, attitudes toward recycling, sense of community, and socioeconomic status of neighborhood on levels of participation in a recently introduced curbside collection program. The influence of cultural differences between Catholic and Protestant communities in Belfast is also considered. Our results suggested that socioeconomic status of area was the strongest predictor of recycling participation, with recycling attitudes and sense of community also having some affect, and general environmental concern being found to have no effect. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for theories of proenvironmental behavior and their application to the promotion of recycling participation within communities.
With Municipal solid waste (MSW) management turning into a global problem, capitalizing on resource residuals is one way to ensure sustained material well-being. An extended Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) research model that incorporates moral norms and consequences of recycling is built for probing consumers’ behavioral intentions to recycle waste. Perceived lack of facilities is adopted as a moderator to further examine its impacts on the hypothetical relationships in this extended TPB model. The results from an empirical study of Taiwan indicate that the extended TPB model is a useful research framework to explain consumers’ recycling intentions and that consumers’ perceived lack of facilities also exerts moderating effects on determining consumers’ recycling intentions. Based on the findings, some constructive suggestions are provided to the policy makers to strengthen consumers’ recycling intentions in Taiwan.
Traditional economic policy focuses on reducing the costs and effort of recycling and on building markets for products with recycle content. At the other end of the policy spectrum, ordinances mandating recycling are the policy approach. This article takes an alternative “metaeconomics” approach and suggests a “third way.” It is premised on the possibility that individuals who recycle and those who do not are jointly motivated by financial-based recycling incentives in the self-interest and by the sense of wanting to “do the right thing” in the pursuit of an other-interest. The latter involves true self-sacrifice represented in altruism. The statistical analysis suggests that the probability of an individual being a recycler is determined by the extent to which recycling is important, but in conjunction with an orientation away from favoring just the self-interest. In addition, individuals who recycle are more willing to support a recycling ordinance.
How altruistic, normative, and egoistic factors affect households’ participation in curbside recycling is shown to depend on how participation is measured. If expressed as whether a household participated, the importance of two normative factors (the expectations of household members and of friends and neighbors), an altruistic factor (that recycling helps protect the environment), and an egoistic factor (that recycling is inconvenient) appears similar. However, the altruistic factor has the greatest impact and the egoistic factor the least because of strong beliefs in curbside recycling’s environmental benefit and weak beliefs in its inconvenience. However, when measured by the proportion of different kinds of material a household recycles, the dominant influences are the expectations of other household members and inconvenience. The significance of egoistic concerns, namely, inconvenience and cost, is confirmed by negative attitudes toward user fees for garbage collection and toward drop-off depots as alternatives to curbside pickup.
This paper analyzes the determinants of recycling efforts in Swedish households, and focuses on the case of packaging waste (i.e., paper, glass, plastic, and metal). The analysis builds on a theoretical framework that integrates norm-motivated behavior into a simple economic model of household choice by assuming that the individuals have preferences for maintaining a self-image as morally responsible, and thus norm-compliant, persons. A postal survey was sent out randomly to 2800 households in four different Swedish municipalities, and in the paper self-reported information on recycling rates at the household level is analyzed in an ordered probit regression framework. The results indicate that both economic and moral motives influence inter-household recycling rates. Specifically, convenience matters in the sense that property-close collection in multi-family dwelling houses leads to higher collection rates. The strength of moral (self-enforced) norms explains a large part of the variation across households, but the importance of such norms in driving recycling efforts partly diminishes if improved collection infrastructure makes it easier for households to recycle. Recycling rates at the household level are also positively influenced by the felt ability to favourably affect environmental outcomes as well as by others’ recycling efforts. The paper discusses a number of policy implications that follow from the empirical results.
Industrial symbiosis networks are generally assumed to provide economic and environmental benefits for all firms involved, though few quantifications have been produced in the literature, and the methods for these quantifications have varied. This paper provides an approach to quantify environmental performance of industrial symbiosis using guidance from the literature of life cycle assessment. Additionally, an approach to distribute credits due to exchanges for firms in the industrial symbiosis network is outlined. From the approach, influential methodological considerations used for the quantifications are discussed, including e.g. the production of reference systems, allocation methods, system boundaries and functional unit. The implications of such an approach may be beneficial for the industrial symbiosis community and provide information crucial for taxes, subsidies, business relations, expansion possibilities for the network, marketing and other issues related to the environmental performance of firms in the industrial symbiosis network.
In modern survey methods growing emphasis is placed on the objective selection of the sample. For surveys of the general population, increasing use is made of area sampling to obtain probability samples of households. Heretofore, scant attention has been given to the question of how to make an objective selection among the members of the household.A procedure for selecting objectively one member of the household is given as used in four surveys of the adult population. Demographic data as found in the sample are compared with outside sources for available factors.* Presented at the 107th Annual Meeting of the American Statistical Association, New York City, December 30, 1947.
This research investigated the effect of convenience on recycling frequency and variables that could be used as indicators in the prediction of recycling behavior as a basis for including textiles in curbside recycling programs. Results clearly indicated that access to curbside recycling significantly affected the amount and variety of materials recycled. Logistic regression results pointed to the variables of access, shopping behaviors, age, family size, and income as significant predictors of recycling activity, regardless of how recycling activity was defined. Despite reduced access to textile recycling opportunities, textile recycling overall was still high. The authors concluded that households with high recycling activity could be identified and targeted for extending curbside recycling programs to include textiles. To continue to reduce the amount of solid waste that is diverted to landfills, curbside recycling programs must be extended to include a greater diversity of postconsumer waste products such as textiles and apparel.
Recycling is becoming ever more important as waste generation rates increase globally. Policy-makers must decide which recycling practices to implement from the host of options at their disposal to best divert waste from landfill. This study strived to determine the most important characteristics in recycling programs that were associated with higher material recovery rates, including bag limits, user pay programs, the number of materials collected, curbside collection frequency, promotion and education (P&E) activities, Best Practice principles, and the type of recycling collection stream. Data collected from 223 recycling programs in Ontario during 2005-2010 were used to perform multiple regression analyses. The findings of this study suggest that attributes of convenience are more important to encourage recycling than those that penalize disposal, thus providing important implications for waste policy-makers, both in Ontario and in other jurisdictions.
Households’ recycling effort is often argued to be of an insignificant size. It is also frequently argued that this contribution, if significant, is not a cost to households, since it is voluntary. Thus households’ use of time and energy are frequently disregarded in cost-benefit analyses of stricter recycling targets. In this survey, based on 1162 interviews, we find that sorting at source involves significant extra use of time and energy in the households. On average, each of those asked reported that they use close to half an hour a week for cleaning, sorting and transporting recyclable waste. On average, 185 h is used per tonne of waste. Four out of ten reported that they use warm or hot water to clean the materials. When investigating the motives for sorting waste, we find that many perceive sorting as mandatory, while some in fact find it a pleasant activity in itself. Moral motives for sorting at source are also widespread. A majority would prefer that a company took over the sorting if this were possible, and on average, the respondents are willing to pay US$ 20/year for this service.
Improving the quality and capture of materials collected for recycling is at the top of the waste agenda for many English local authorities. In recent years, the focus has shifted away from general awareness raising techniques in favour of methods that can bring about behaviour change. This paper reports on three projects each using a different behaviour change based approach, which all aimed to increase participation in the recycling collection scheme and to reduce inclusion of non-targeted materials (“contamination”). The three projects—one doorstepping-based, one incentives-based and one delivering personalised feedback to residents were carried out in Portsmouth between 2005 and 2006 during a period where there were no major changes to the collection infrastructure.The findings show that personalised incentives and feedback were highly effective at reducing contamination. Both methods resulted in a halving of the number of households setting out contaminants on collection day. The feedback approach was considerably more cost-effective than the other two approaches, costing ∼£0.50 per household to implement the campaign and averaging ∼£3.00 for every household which subsequently displayed behaviour change. There was little improvement in the quality of collected materials attributed to doorstepping alone. None of the projects resulted in significant changes in recycling scheme participation; however, this may be because participation was initially high.These findings suggest that behaviour change is most effectively brought about using simple, low-cost methods to engage with residents at the point of service delivery, i.e. by the collection crews whilst emptying bins. The challenge now is to integrate this into service delivery as standard.
The hypothesis, that injunctive and descriptive norms interact positively or synergistically to promote cooperation in social dilemmas, is tested in the context of a survey study focusing on environmentally responsible behaviour. Measurement error and strong and positive correlations between the two types of normative beliefs make it difficult to test the interaction hypothesis. By using structural equation modelling with residual centering, these problems are overcome and the interaction hypothesis is confirmed. The result is stable across three replications spanning a two-year period.
For UK statutory recycling targets to be met, kerbside collection schemes must strive towards optimal performance levels at which the quantities and composition of materials recovered closely matche potentially recoverable materials in the household waste stream. Multivariate analysis of recyclable materials data for regions in the UK showed that there exist substantial differences between the composition of recovered and recoverable materials per household, per week. The similarity between recovered and recoverable materials was not closely related to the range of materials collected at the kerbside. The provision of kerbside recycling facilities for two or more materials, as required by the Household Waste Recycling Act [Household Waste Recycling Act. Office of Public Sector Information, London, UK; 2003, http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2003/20030029.htm (accessed 19 May 2004)], does not appear to lead necessarily to high levels of recycling. Modes of behaviour revealed by statistical analysis showed that frequently recycling households were characterised by elements of episodicity and persistence; enhancement of cans and plastics recovery should be a key aim for the promotion of kerbside recycling amongst such households. We conclude that if multi-material kerbside recycling of household waste is to perform well, modification of kerbside schemes to broaden the range of targeted materials must be accompanied by promotional and educational campaigns, focused, as a short term priority, on medium and high recyclers and with emphasis on recognition of cans and plastics.
This work centers on the study of consumer recycling roles to examine the sociodemographic and psychographic profile of the distribution of recycling tasks and roles within the household. With this aim in mind, an empirical work was carried out, the results of which suggest that recycling behavior is multidimensional and comprises the undertaking of different roles with different sociodemographic and psychographic causal characteristics. The practical implications of these results can be applied in the implementation of segmentation policies that consider recycling behavior as the product on offer in a discriminate fashion depending on the role to be promoted among the population.
Social and moral norms and the opportunity cost of time will affect household recycling efforts. A model is developed to describe how norms affect the recycling decision through feelings of self-respect, guilty conscience, and warm-glow, as well as respect in, and sanctions from, the community. We find that the opportunity cost of time has a significant negative effect on household recycling. All indicators of warm-glow, social, and moral norms increase household recycling efforts. We find no evidence of crowding-out, neither when recycling is perceived as mandatory, nor when economic incentives are introduced in the form of a differentiated garbage fee.
Several studies have demonstrated that individual contributions to public goods are increasing in others’ contributions. The underlying causes for this, however, are not yet fully understood. We present a model of duty-orientation in which moral responsibility is learned through observations of others’ behavior. Since, in our model, responsibility is a burden, we hypothesize that individuals will be reluctant to accept responsibility based on uncertain information. Econometric analysis of data from a survey on households’ glass recycling indicates that perceived responsibility is a major determinant for reported recycling; that responsibility ascription is influenced by beliefs about others’ behavior; and that people are indeed reluctant to accept responsibility based on uncertain information.
The paper presents results of research into municipal waste treatment in the Czech Republic. Its special focus is on the impacts of various municipal solid waste charging systems on separating and recycling efforts of municipalities and households. The municipal solid waste charging systems are shortly described first, including the principles of the relevant Czech legislation. It shows that the Czech waste legislation provides space for implementing Pay-as-You-Throw (PAYT) models in the Czech Republic. The main results of representative surveys conducted by the authors within the EU PAYT project in 2003 in selected Czech municipalities and Prague households are shown. The survey confirmed that in municipalities that apply the PAYT charging system, citizens separate more waste and produce less residual waste. The survey data analysis has also shown which factors contributing to satisfactory waste separation are relevant and should be taken into the account when providing policy recommendations for introducing PAYT charging systems in other cities.
The aim of this study is to analyze the antecedents of urban waste recycling behavior. To achieve this goal, a concrete urban waste management program was chosen. The study focuses on the Selective Collection Program (SCP) in Zaragoza, a medium-sized city in northeastern Spain. The research starts with a conceptual model in which the variables that potentially affect recycling behavior can be classified into two groups: incentives and barriers. Moreover, the sociodemographic characteristics of the individuals are included in our study. Given that the proposed model requires specification of latent variables or constructs, the analysis is based on the Structural Equation Models (SEM) methodology. The results revealed that environmental awareness, knowledge of the environmental impact of urban waste, and the positive perception of management by local government exercise a positive effect on individual recycling behavior, while perceived personal difficulties (space and time availability) and distance to and from the container have a negative effect. As regards sociodemographic variables, this study found that annual family income sustains a negative relationship with recycling behavior, while age maintains a positive one. The results obtained clearly show the important role that the public authorities play, especially municipal governments, in achieving the waste recycling objectives established in accordance with international legislation.