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Instructors: Prof. Dr. Fenna Blomsma; Julia Gross
Event type:
Lecture + practical course
Displayed in timetable as:
Indust. Ecol.
Hours per week:
3
Credits:
6,0
Language of instruction:
English
Min. | Max. participants:
- | 90
Comments/contents:
The objective of this module is to provide students with insight into the research field of industrial ecology, and in particular how circular economy strategies can be leveraged to provide value for both business and environment. Students will be put in a position to recognize the relevance of the topic of environmental sustainability for business practices and to understand corporate strategies for effective waste and resource management so that resource conservation, efficiency and productivity can be improved.
Learning objectives:
Specifically, students will learn to:
- Explain how a circular economy is different from a linear economy
- Describe the unique features of a circular economy and list the reasons for why a business may want to ‘go circular’
- See 'waste' in a new way through the five types of ‘structural waste’ and the circular strategies that can be used to address each type
- Incl. learning to identify structural waste in examples
- Understand and describe 'circular configurations'
- Or: how circular strategies can work together synergistically and how trade-offs between them can be managed
- Incl. an assessment of the contribution, drawbacks and limits of specific circular strategies
- Analyse which Eco-design practices are needed and describe what they involve
- Incl. application to examples
- Evaluate approaches of companies conducting circular oriented innovation
- Contrast and compare traditional change management approaches with those based on learning and experimentation
- Incl. the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches and being able to apply this to an example
- Reflect critically on the circular economy concept
- Construct arguments in favour of circular economy approaches, whilst balancing these with the potential limitations and drawbacks of the approach
Didactic concept:
This module makes the most of flexible self-paced learning and scheduled interactive sessions: it consists of a mix of asynchornous lecture videos and synchronous (live) (group) sessions and exercises. Precise schedule to be confirmed.
Literature:
Most lectures have obligatory reading materials associated with them, in the form of academic papers or book chapters. These material provide the needed background and deepening to master the materials in this course. They will be made available as the course progresses.
Additional examination information:
This module incl. the take-home-exam are in English.
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