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The transition to Circular Economy necessitates right incentives for choosing products and services with lower environmental impacts, in the form of price signals and sufficient environmental information. An ecolabel indicates that the product is, environmentally speaking, among the best products available on the market and thus has the role to steer stepwise developments towards sustainability. The Swan criteria promote quality products with requirements on durability and the use of secondary raw materials. To further align the criteria with Circular Economy, future criteria development might focus more on aspects including upgradability, reparability, multi-functionality, component reuse and innovative forms of consumption and production. This report was prepared as part of a Nordic project, and the results could be useful in the development of the Nordic Ecolabel in the future.
The transition to Circular Economy necessitates right incentives for choosing products and services with lower environmental impacts, in the form of price signals and sufficient environmental information. An ecolabel indicates that the product is, environmentally speaking, among the best products available on the market and thus has the role to steer stepwise developments towards sustainability. The Swan criteria promote quality products with requirements on durability and the use of secondary raw materials. To further align the criteria with Circular Economy, future criteria development might focus more on aspects including upgradability, reparability, multi-functionality, component reuse and innovative forms of consumption and production. This report was prepared as part of a Nordic project, and the results could be useful in the development of the Nordic Ecolabel in the future.
The purpose of this report is to compare the Nordic Swan Ecolabel and the Product Environmental Footprint with a focus on environmental information. The report compares the methods used by the Nordic Swan Ecolabel and the PEF to identify the product-group-specific relevant environmental aspects. The analysis is based on the currently valid Swan Criteria and pilot phase final PEF Category Rules (PEFCRs). The report concludes that there are methodological differences in the way product comparisons are made. The report proposes recommendations for both schemes in terms of co-operation and required further work, related to the differences in methodological approaches, to avoid very different results in what will be considered as an environmentally sound product.
For many years, the Nordic countries have worked together successfully on the environment and climate, which has contributed to significant progress both in the Nordic Region and internationally. However, in recent years, the challenges we face have grown in size and quantity, making co-operation increasingly important. Between 2019 and 2024, the Nordic countries will work together to bring about sustainable development in the Nordic Region, the EU, and internationally. Together, the countries will pursue the ambitious implementation of international agreements on the environment and climate – in particular the Paris Agreement – and work together to strengthen the EU’s regulatory framework regarding the environment and climate. The Nordic countries will continue to be front-runners in terms of bringing about change. Nordic co-operation on the environment and climate seeks to halt the loss of biodiversity and bring about the sustainable use of natural resources. Together, we will work to accelerate the transition to a circular economy that limits our consumption and production to the capacity of nature. Other important areas of co-operation include efforts to minimise the risks posed by chemicals and hazardous substances, and stop the discharge. Compared with previous programme periods, there is a stronger emphasis on co-operation on sustainable cities, climate adaptation, and green financing.
Reliable information is needed to drive the market towards ecologically sound products. Product Environmental Footprint has many properties that are new to the Life Cycle Assessment tradition, increasing the consistency, accuracy and comparability of the results. It is important to start the organization of the PEF scheme, and invest in efforts to rapidly increase the number of product and service groups and actual product-specific PEF reports involved in the PEF scheme. Possibilities for common information basis and coordination between environmental information sources for the various product policy instruments and the PEF should be explored. Cooperation between type 1 eco-labels like the Nordic Swan and the forthcoming PEF scheme(s) is important.
The Organisation Environmental Footprint (OEF) initiative of the European Commission and the Nordic Swan Ecolabel both aim at more sustainable consumption and production. We compared the two schemes in relation to their environmental information concerning the retail sector. The Swan aims to push stores to perform better and to help customers make environmental choices, whereas the OEF aims to create a common Life Cycle Assessment based methodology to assess impacts related to a retailer’s product portfolio. Overall, the OEF is considered a broader approach still under development, while the Swan is well-known in the Nordics. Their scopes, relevant impact categories and life cycle stages differed. However, climate change, resource use and biodiversity impacts were significant in both schemes. Possible synergies concern criteria setting, measurement and communication.
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Product lifetimes are critical for the circular economy, resource efficiency, waste reduction and low carbon strategies for sustainability, and are therefore of interest to academics from many different disciplines as well as original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and other stakeholders. The challenges related to product lifetimes must be tackled from multiple perspectives, making the sharing of knowledge and expertise from different disciplines particularly important. This book presents papers from the second Product Lifetime and the Environment (PLATE) conference, held in Delft, the Netherlands, in November 2017. The conference originated from the desire to bring together academic researchers working in the field of sustainability to benefit from each other’s knowledge and further advance the field. The book includes the 88 full papers delivered at the conference, grouped according to the following 7 conference themes: design for product longevity; product lifetime optimization; cultural perspectives on the throwaway society; circular economy and product lifetimes; business opportunities, economic implications and marketing strategies; consumer influences on product lifetimes; and policy, regulation and legislation. The book will be of interest to all those concerned with sustainable consumption, circular economy and resource efficiency.
This is an account of the Swan label’s first thirty years, written in chronological order with short chapters each illustrating various aspects of the scheme. There are few areas of public life in which there have been so many vague pronouncements as for environmental protection. Perhaps that’s because it’s so easy to agree on the goals, but sohard to find the right solutions and practise what you preach. Here at the Nordic Swan, we’ve done things properly from dayone by setting concrete, measurable environmental performance requirements and turning the environment into a competitive advantage. There have been many conflicts and disagreements, but no one can deny that ecolabelling has led to significant environmental improvements. The Nordic region with its 30 million people is the world’s twelfthlargest economy, and this makes a difference when businesses plan product changes and marketing campaigns. The label is a success far beyond the borders of the Nordic region.
Available online: https://pub.norden.org/temanord2020-543/ A systematic and continuously measurement of the progress towards the circular economy can inform decision making and policies, and thus strengthen the circular transition. However, this pre-study, mapping circular economy indicators across the Nordic countries on both national and sub-national level, reveals that as of 2020, data streams and indicators are missing for the inner loops of the circular economy. A monitoring system embracing only selected aspects of the circular economy (where data is readily available) risks exaggerating the focus on these areas and downgrade the importance of other areas where data is unattainable, even though the latter may (in principle) be creating more circular value (such as prolonging products’ lifetimes).