Sharing Economy and Circular Economy in Smart Cities
There are two terms that have gained more traction over the past few years within Cities and among entrepreneurs. These are the Sharing Economy and Circular Economy.
The takeaways from COP26 seem to have more of a political focus than a concrete action plan. Nevertheless, many countries have taken initiatives to reduce emissions and improve the air quality in their cities. These initiatives started some years back, and the cities continuously improved by reaching their promised goals.
In Asia, Singapore is one of the leading nations that still have a lot of work to achieve their goals. But with the new Green Plan, the city-state has set a determined path toward renewable energy and reduced carbon emissions.
Sharing Economy
Today, you can experience ride-hailing services in Singapore, as well as food delivery services. The delivery services are provided mainly by bicycles, electric bikes and scooters, and motorbikes. The ride-hailing services are primarily private cars and Taxis; many vehicles are transitioning to hybrid or EV vehicles.
We should expect more green spaces and parks with the Green Plan, and public transport, such as bus services, will be EVs. Electric buses will solve the current noise pollution.
Since the pandemic, the government has allowed home-based businesses to offer products and services. Since many employees in the service sector lost their jobs, many of these individuals and other citizens started to provide baked goods and pre-ordered food. With the existing delivery service in place, this became an easy setup. Many of these food orders come from social media like Facebook or Instagram. Perhaps, we will soon see a home-cooking ordering app?
There are many other opportunities in a sharing economy. What are the services you have in your city?
Circular Economy
The biological live-cycle shows how nature is a sustainable ecosystem that provides food for the following species and nutrients to the earth as an organism dies and decomposes. This works as long as the ecosystem is not disrupted by human toxic waste.
Most of the products we produce contain components and parts that will not decompose in nature. This means that waste is continuously accumulated in landfills around the world. More than 2 billion metric tons of waste are produced every year. And only a fraction is recycled.
We all want to own stuff, like a car or a new phone and washing machine and TV, etc., and every time a new model comes out, we throw away the still functional old phone, for example, and get the new model.
The problem in our cities is that we throw away tons of waste that could still be used or where parts could be reused through a different life cycle. Since we all want to OWN things, we will not achieve a complete circular economy.
Yes, there will be many recycling methods, which will result in refined and reusable products, but the ownership of things may still result in piles of waste.
What if we looked at a shared economy model, where people may lease a product from the manufacturer, who then takes back the used product at the end of the product lifecycle, refurbishing or reusing the components to build new products?
