“The circular economy is not only respectful of the environment, but it can mean saving billions of euros,” said Jules Coignard, the director and co-founder of the circular economy platform Circul’r at a conference on the circular economy yesterday at the Barcelona campus of TBS Business School.
Founded in 2014, Circul’r is a Paris-based network of over 500 companies around the world in the circular economy. Its platform connects startups and companies to co-create circular economy solutions. We recently featured 10 promising European circular economy startups that are setting out to make our world a better place.
“The linear economy model we have now is no longer useful,” said Coignard, referring to the large amount of waste generated from the traditional ‘use and dispose’ model. He also said that “we must learn from nature” – as nature has no solid waste in it, but everything is reused.
Coignard mentioned Patagonia and the global carpet manufacturing leader Interface as success stories of large companies that have applied the circular economy model.
“These two companies have shown us that the circular economy works very well from a business perspective,” he said.
Circul’r’s main objective is to show that the circular economy production model has a better impact on the environment while new business opportunities are applied.
