Circular Economy Matrix Guiding Manufacturing Industry Companies towards Circularity—A Multiple Case Study Perspective

Leila Saari (), Katri Valkokari (), Jorge Tiago Martins () and Federica Acerbi ()
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Leila Saari: VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd
Katri Valkokari: VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd
Jorge Tiago Martins: VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd
Federica Acerbi: Politecnico di Milano

Circular Economy and Sustainability, 2024, vol. 4, issue 4, 2505-2530

Abstract: Abstract Manufacturing companies struggle with overwhelming expectations, disruptions and trends sweeping over their business environment. The evident climate change, together with rising sustainable development goals, is forcing companies to discover their environmental impact, in addition to the more familiar economic one. The transformation from a linear economy to a circular economy (CE) reduces waste and improves resource efficiency through the deployed R-cycles, such as recycle, reuse and repair. This transformation is feasible for multinational enterprises because they can allocate sufficient resources for their strategic development goals. For small and medium-sized enterprises (SME), any additional investment must be carefully assessed and planned. Thus, SMEs need support and tools to select their next development investments. Generally, maturity models help companies find their status (compared to others) and identify the most important development areas and actions. This paper presents the CE maturity matrix, which comprises five maturity levels mapped with seven linear manufacturing value chain phases. The matrix was piloted with nine manufacturing industry companies, four of which were from Finland, one from Italy, one from Germany and three from Ireland. The CE matrix interview results showed that none of the interviewed manufacturing industry companies remained at the linearity level. The most common levels varied between systemic material management and CE thinking. In the interviews, over 40 CE actions were identified as the argument for a company reaching a CE maturity level. The transition towards sustainable manufacturing has already started but will require efforts to accelerate and to engage companies to proceed.

Keywords: Circular economy; Manufacturing industry; Maturity model; Circular manufacturing; Sustainable development goals; Manufacturing value chain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1007/s43615-024-00385-3

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