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constRuctive mEtabolic processes For materiaL flOWs in urban and peri-urban environments across Europe

Project description

Co-creating circular and regenerative resource flows in cities

The research project REFLOW sets out to offer a new approach to circular economy (CE) in urban areas. REFLOW will provide best practices aligning market and government needs in order to create favourable conditions for the public and private sector to adopt CE practices. Active citizen involvement and systemic change are needed to re-think the current approach. Concretely, REFLOW will create new CE business models within 6 pilot cities: Amsterdam, Berlin, Cluj-Napoca, Milan, Paris and Vejle and assess their social, environmental and economic impact. In each of the pilots, citizens will be involved in developing and testing circular products, software, and business models for their own city. REFLOW’s ambition is to offer tools and guidelines that other cities can adopt.

Objective

The vision of REFLOW is to develop circular and regenerative cities through the re-localisation of production and the re-configuration of material flows at different scales. More specifically, it will use Fab Labs and makerspaces as catalysers of a systemic change in urban and peri-urban environments, which enable, visualize and regulate “four freedoms”: free movement of materials, people, (technological) knowledge and commons, in order to reduce materials consumption, maximize multifunctional use of (public) spaces and envisage regenerative practices.
Concretely, REFLOW aims at providing realistic best practices aligning market and government needs in order to create favourable conditions for the public and private sector to adopt circular principles. In order to provide critical examples of ways in which cities can adopt a CE model and reach the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, REFLOW will create new CE business models (Distributed Design Market model, On-Demand System, Corporate Hacking and Corporate Pyramid) within 6 pilot cities (Amsterdam, Berlin, Milan, Paris, Vejle and Cluj-Napoca) and assess their social, environmental and economic impact.
The project will make use of blockchain technologies in order to incentivise the circular practices in local ecosystems and data visualisation tools to enable continuous monitoring and optimisation of “urban metabolic” processes and rapid interventions management. Networks of sensors, urban computing and geo-localisation will capture data ensuring accuracy, integrity and interoperability of relevant data infrastructures, while data visualisation and standard templates will be available for effective communication, public consultation, and exchange of experiences.

Call for proposal

H2020-SC5-2018-2019-2020

See other projects for this call

Sub call

H2020-SC5-2018-2

Coordinator

COPENHAGEN BUSINESS SCHOOL
Net EU contribution
€ 1 272 304,75
Address
SOLBJERG PLADS 3
2000 Frederiksberg
Denmark

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Region
Danmark Hovedstaden Byen København
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Links
Total cost
€ 1 272 304,75

Participants (27)