Measuring circularity progress

Transitioning to circular economy practices and business models is a top priority if you listen to most corporations. Press releases making big commitments and pledges to going circular are now commonplace. But how can we be sure that genuine progress is being made?

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation is answering that question with Circulytics 2.0, which it labels the ‘most comprehensive circularity measurement tool’ available. It enables users to assess how far they have gone towards circularity and pinpoints the actions that will allow them to go further.

“Circulytics supports a company’s transition towards the circular economy, regardless of industry, complexity, and size,” the Ellen MacArthur Foundation says. “Going beyond assessing products and material flows, this company-level measuring tool reveals the extent to which a company has achieved circularity across its entire operations. It does this by using the widest set of indicators currently available: enablers and outcomes.”

To learn more about the power and potential of this tool, I am delighted to have Jarkko Havas join me on today’s episode of Inside Ideas. Jarkko leads the Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s Insights & Analysis work around data and metrics. Where his focus is on measuring company level circular economy performance using the Circulytics tool, which has been ‘developed by the Foundation in collaboration with 13 Strategic Partners and member companies’.

Jarko talks to me about the inextricable links between climate change and the way ‘we use and produce materials’ and says it is critical companies are able to properly monitor how they are doing in making these materials in a more circular way.

“We want to ensure companies report in the future on their circular economy performance to show how they are acting to have these positive impacts,” he said.