Industrial Symbiosis: A Sectoral Analysis on Enablers and Barriers

Abstract

Industrial Symbiosis (IS) around the world in the last 20 years had been characterized through an extensive analysis of scientific papers on the IS emerging process, with a special focus on its early stages. The literature suggests that in this process there are key factors (enablers, barriers, triggers, and challenges) that play a critical role in Industrial Symbiosis. From those factors, the enablers and barriers have been highlighted in most of the studies in their different dimensions (social, economic, policy, technological, management, or geographical, amongst others). Several implementation cases suggest that the relevance of these factors rely on the dominant economic sectors involved. This study aims to reveal the key enablers and barriers in various economic sectors and its behaviour according to each one. To accomplish this objective, a comprehensive assessment methodology was designed and performed. This methodology is divided in two sequential phases: the first, sectoral analysis, focuses on the identification of the more relevant dimensions per economic sectors; in the second phase, incidence analysis, the individual behaviour of the enablers and barriers per economic sector are identified. This new approach correlates the economic sectors and factors incidence in order to provide new insights on the key barriers, and enablers on different dimensions. The main result of this study consists in the identification of a set of recommendations that might be critical to reinforce the emerging synergies process and to help overcome the barriers in each economic sector analysed.

Relating Industrial Symbiosis and Sustainable Development Goals

“…Promoting inclusive and sustainable industrialization (target 9.2) has demonstrated the potential of IS in creating new businesses and jobs [8]. Upgrade infrastructure (target 9.4) to implement industrial symbiosis can benefit all parties involved and contribute significantly to sustainable growth and greenhouse gas reduction (GHG), especially in energy-intensive sectors such as the cement sector [32]. Regarding the enhanced scientific research (target 9.5), several studies point out that in order to achieve an effective implementation of the industrial symbiosis it is fundamental to promote research in industry, designed to solve real-world problems and generate insights with direct high utility for business practices [33].…”

The Dutch Green Deals Policy and Its Applicability to Circular Economy Policies

“…Especially related to policy, there are typically regulatory barriers to trading waste and, even if it is possible, this is often blocked by hard to acquire permits, and there is uncertainty about future policies [77]. Other relevant barriers identified by Henriques et al (2021) [77] are an instable demand for circular products, a lack of financing (both private and public), and a lack of knowledge on available solutions, complemented by a lack of intermediaries that enable communication and set up networks for innovation. In the case of using recycled products, governments can take away barriers by sharing information, settings standards, preferring recycled products in green public procurement, and by stimulating the market [78].…”

Implementing Industrial Symbiosis Incentives: an Applied Assessment Framework for Risk Mitigation

“…These studies have also recognized the existence of a group of factors that appear and end up being crucial for the synergies promotion [12,41], they are normally called key or intervening factors. Those factors are defined as determinants for the emerging process of synergies [42], cross-cutting different dimensions, namely, policy, social, economic, intermediaries, geographical, and technological [4,12,40,[42][43][44][45][46][47][48]. Over the years, literature categorizes these key factors into different groups: enablers, drivers, challenges, barriers, etc.…”

“…The internal common risk factors listed in the first cluster are mostly associated with financial risks such as dependency and lack of funds to promote IS [39,44,80]. Social factors such as lack of motivation [47] and lack of knowledge [42] were also identified. From an external perspective, lack of policy that allows symbiotic exchanges [31,38], the complexity of the regulations for waste recovery, and limitations of national financing in terms of industrial sustainability were the main risk factors identified.…”

“…Government entities cannot limit themselves as a funding entity but should also act as promoters. Also, the increase of community awareness in environmental problems and sustainable development [47], through knowledge transfer, will also play an important role to overcome issues like lack of interest and knowledge [42]. Lastly, the reinforcement and commitment in the dissemination of IS and its benefits [82,83], and greater participation/ involvement in the promotion of the Circular Economy and its business models (through conferences, workshops, action groups, or regional communication plans) are important mitigation measures in this cluster.…”