IoT is the key to enabling comprehensive management of the Circular Economy
Knowledge and participation are the keys to achieving a new development system that is sustainable both from an environmental and economic point of view. The concept of a Circular Economy, in which nothing can be taken away from the planet and nothing can be abandoned in it, presupposes a thorough knowledge of the processes of transformation, products and materials not only related to their work environment but also along their value chain and in other sectors that can be intersected.
Knowledge, which cannot stop at a given academic but which must be strongly accessible to all operators. It is easy to imagine how in this context the collection and exchange of data and information is the first step to enable major systemic change. The IoT (Internet of Things) is by its nature the tool to use to allow this exchange; when you go beyond the boundaries of the individual company you get to talk aboutIoT platforms.
Holonix implements IoT solutions for companies – such as i-Live Machines, service product for industrial machinery manufacturers – both by facilitating the collection of information from machines, products and people and creating connections between them. In recent years, thanks to the research activities and the solid technological bases that it has, it is expanding this concept taking it outside of individual companies and highlighting how digital technologies can contain costs and generate value.
IoT Platforms for Circular Economy Management are designed to manage materials, products and processes for reuse, rework and recycling and to monitor their sustainability. They develop along two main guidelines:
■ Create a knowledge base common: tell what is being done, what products are being treated, what processes can be made available to carry out the necessary transformations, what waste is being produced and how it can be reused, how the objects are being constructed, that they have spent during their life cycle, how they can disassemble
and rework, where they are, what laws we must respect, what the economic and environmental impact is, etc.
■ Create participation and connectionsbetween different realities: look for resources (products, waste, processes), look for companies, interact with companies from other sectors, cooperate with external designers to set up circular products,
gather the ideas of all, etc.
The data that can be managed through these platforms are multiple and range from personal information to distinct bases, from environmental impact data to economic values, from life cycle of objects to process details. Data exchange is subject to individual business choices, flexible, traced, secure. Additional technologies and services, such as blockchain, can also be activated.
Holonix has already applied this concept by testing its IoT Platform with the project Fibereuse(www.fibereuse.eu, H2020-730323-1) which operates in the field of fiberglass and carbon from and used in the production of wind turbines, construction, automotive and bathroom sanitary The Project plans to present the results at the Milano FuoriSalone 2020