Guidelines and best practices to boost territorial circular cluster: from waste to resources

Description

The aim of the course is to present research, best practices and operational protocols, validated on vast territories, in order to make the recovery of municipal waste to be put back on the market effective and efficient, with a view to a short-range circular economy. 

The objects under investigation are:

• mineral waste from demolition activities, including excavated material, and from mining activities;
• municipal organic waste, or from agro-food chains, and by-products derived therefrom.
   

The TRAINING COURSE + WORKSHOP will be divided into four main stages:

- Session A

Talks by expert researchers in the field, both Italian and Spanish;

- Session B

Organisation of round tables and thematic sessions, in which representatives of public administrations, companies, professionals, trade associations will participate;

- Session C

Group work, divided in such a way as to ensure the presence of representatives of each category involved. This activity is intended to be a moment of active confrontation between operators in the sector (public and private) and future generations (actual implementers of policies aimed at sustainable, responsible and ethical development).

- Session D

Presentation and visit of the LIVING LAB installed in the Alpignano (TO) area in order to test different substitutes for natural soil (technosols, obtained by mixing the fine matrices deriving from the treatment of construction and demolition waste, compost, natural soil, biodigestates deriving from agro-food or livestock waste).

Why this course

Sustainable waste management and the effective application of products obtained from their treatment still represent a challenge to be faced and won, also and above all at a territorial system level. In particular, for urban waste (organic and demolition), and for mining and excavation waste, several steps forward have been taken in the production of new products to be applied in the environmental and civil fields. However, market and operational conditions are often lacking to systematically move from laboratory or pilot scale to industrial and market scale.

The course, which also includes a workshop between actors involved in the management of urban and mineral waste, has as its primary objective to update the audience on the latest news (scientific, technological, economic, legal, etc...) relating to the recovery of these wastes to produce products effectively absorbed by the market (at local scale).