Circular Economy Profiles for communicating CIRCOMOD results to a wider audience

The transition to a circular economy (CE) can be a key strategy for mitigating climate change and achieving sustainable development. However, translating complex scientific findings into actionable insights for policymakers, businesses, and the general public remains a challenge. To bridge this gap, the CIRCOMOD project introduces Circular Economy Profiles (CE Profiles) as an approach to making CE-climate modelling results accessible, standardized, and easy to understand.

What Are CE Profiles?
CE Profiles provide a concise yet comprehensive overview of CIRCOMOD’s innovative research, which integrates extensive data collection with advanced model coupling to assess the impact of CE on climate change mitigation. Designed as two-page summaries, CE Profiles distil key findings into a structured and visually engaging format, ensuring that essential insights reach a broader audience effectively.
Each CE Profile focuses on a specific material (e.g., steel, aluminium, cement/concrete), sector (e.g., buildings, vehicles), or region (e.g., individual countries, the EU). In addition to these standardized PDFs, an interactive online tool will offer users more flexibility in selecting and exploring data.

Structure of a CE Profile
Every CE Profile follows a consistent structure to facilitate comprehension and comparison, beginning with a general introduction to the material, sector, or region in focus. It then presents the current state regarding CE and a potential future CE scenario, supported by a Sankey diagram illustrating material flows and key CE indicators, as well as a brief explanation of the core assumptions underlying the scenario. Finally, the CE Profiles conclude with a socio-economic and environmental assessment of this future CE pathway, leading to targeted recommendations.
Moreover, a comprehensive documentation will provide additional information, background knowledge, indicator definitions, explanations and references for all CE Profiles.

Combining Literature and Stakeholder Engagement
The development of CE Profiles is grounded in both literature and expert consultation. The initial concept was refined through discussions with stakeholders from academia, policy, NGOs, and industry, ensuring that the CE Profiles meet diverse informational needs. A detailed description of the methodology and the final CE Profile framework is documented in Deliverable 4.3, which will soon be available at https://circomod.eu/circomod-deliverables/.

Next Steps: From Concept to Impactful Communication
In the coming months, additional data collection will be conducted for the status quo section of the CE Profiles, and the list of indicators will be refined based on updated model output variables to ensure their feasibility. Once the final project results are available, they will be integrated into the CE Profiles and disseminated widely. By making cutting-edge CE research more accessible, CE Profiles aim to foster informed decision-making and encourage concrete actions toward a more sustainable and circular future.
Stay tuned for updates as we roll out the first CE Profiles and contribute to a global shift towards a circular economy!