The awareness of environmental emergencies, such as climate changes and the exploitation of non-renewable resources, is driving research to new business models, following the zero-waste school of thought. Since many years, the circular economy provides good examples of transition from linear to circular, especially in the production and waste management sectors. Yet, it is still far from being applied through effective spatial planning processes.
The research is aimed to answer two main questions: how can the circularity benefit a territory? Is there any operational device or mechanism that can facilitate the transition from linear to circular planning? The answers could come from the context-based concept of metabolism and from its adaptive governance.
Locally, principles of recovering and recycling might improve the metabolism effectiveness, mostly when based on upcycling processes. Within a designed logical framework (research programme), the hypothesis is tested within a case-study area: the Po river Delta (PrD). Since PrD is at the same time a marginal and protected area, it is referred to the national strategy of ‘internal areas’ and the Unesco strategies on Reserves of Biosphere. Such a double reference is assumed as a base for a peculiar form of metabolism: an equilibrium between human being and nature is likely to guarantee a day-by-day symbiosis response to the highly dynamic morphology all along the sea cost.
The methodology consists of:
- setting local territorial metabolisms with a systemic design approach in order to identify the flows of materials and the potential cycles
- implementing a local database of production wastes
- performing GIS analysis to evaluate the status quo. In detail, soil features are combined with land uses to map main critical issues where to apply regeneration practices
- mapping the current planning tools at all levels, to assess the external effectiveness and design a multi-level strategy
– defining a Strategic Plan based on ‘Waste-to-Resource’ scenario to address both private and public stakeholders. Guidelines will lead policies, rules and permission practices at all the statutory planning levels
- creating a monitoring system to evaluate the strategy effects and get in a single or double loop of learning
Specifically, the method applied to PrD highlights the opportunity of upcycling shellfish from aquaculture and biomass and zoo-technical waste from farming. They may become regenerative resource for the entire territory. Local treatment plants (like bio-digesters based on phyto-remediation) can produce energy and natural fertilizer for the local communities. This will enable the reduction of waste and pollution (environment), new skilled job opportunities (society) and new value chains (economy).
The results are currently limited to applying the regeneration model to a specific territorial scale. It would be furthermore interesting to assess how the strategy can be modulated by scaling it within a multiscale location scenario.
#territorial regeneration #waste to resource #circular economy #strategic planning #systemic design
6a. Land use and planning
