Market Intelligence Report
March 2024 Newsletter
A debrief highlighting the most important, impactful and interesting topics affecting the sector.
Market Intelligence Report
ISB Global Achieves 43% Revenue Growth: “ISB Global, the UK-based provider of software to the global waste management sector achieved 43 percent revenue growth in 2023 compared to the previous year, the company announced today. This growth was driven largely by ISB Global’s customer base of small and medium waste management operators in the UK, in which the company continues to invest resources and expert knowledge. ISB Global is aiming for further revenue growth in 2024 with the US launch of its flagship product Waste and Recycling One (WR1) later this year. The launch will support ISB Global’s plans to expand its core client base in the UK, and to also expand its footprint in the US where the waste management sector is undergoing rapid digitalisation.”
News we thought was of interest
Achieving Net Zero with SAP’s Sustainability & Circular Economy Solutions – A Snapshot of Market & Solutions Progress
“…We can interrogate upstream supply chain data, which relates to what a product is made from, but we don’t yet have a complete downstream picture of what happens to a product at its end of life. Recyclability varies wildly between countries, so to understand how recyclable materials are in certain countries or jurisdictions, a partnership approach with national governments, local authorities, NGOs, and others is required to build a database that can inform companies which types of plastic to use or avoid for certain markets to achieve circularity. SAP can add value by collecting this data and pulling it into solutions.
At the same time, to embrace the circular economy, our way of working must evolve. Instead of working in silos within our individual businesses and in vertical supply chains, we need to work collaboratively to share the data and bring the skill sets and processes together. For example, SAP works with groups of companies, such as with the WBCSD, to establish frameworks for exchanging data. SAP Sustainability Data Exchange started with embedded carbon in products, but the application can be extended to track other important material information for the circular economy like recycled content or water content.”
DEFRA Electronic Waste Consultation closes as problems become greater – Staggering Figures
Household hoards of unused electricals and broken tech are growing, a recycling campaign group warns. Material Focus estimates we’ve gone from stockpiling an average of 20 items to 30 within four years. Its findings come from market research. The top ten products include remote controls, mobile phones and hairdryers. With the UN reporting that electronic waste is rising five times faster than documented recycling, we’re being urged to clean out our “drawers of doom”.
Metabolic investigates Urban Mining Construction Resources in a Dutch City
“Why do we extract, produce, and transport scarce primary materials from mines around the world, when there are abundant secondary sources throughout our cities?
Just like any product, every building has a lifespan. The valuable materials they contain — wood, glass, concrete, metal, electronic or industrial components often end up in a landfill, incinerated, or downcycled into products of much lower economic value.
The concept of urban mining combats losing such valuable resources. It aims to reduce the amount of virgin materials we mine in the traditional sense. Let’s explore how these efforts are gaining momentum in Dutch cities and uncover partnerships and services that develop circular products recovering a significant amount of materials. Let’s see how urban jungles ring with virtual gold mines.”
Collective publishes report on materials use to attain 1.5c & overhaul of Waste Framework Directive
“Eunomia Research and Consulting Ltd. has today published a report ‘Managing materials for 1.5oC: an EU regulatory framework for a low carbon material economy’. It presents a series of recommendations designed to enable Europe to prosper whilst reducing the pressure we place on the planet from our consumption of materials.
The report was funded by a consortium comprised of Handelens Miljøford, Minderoo Foundation, TOMRA, and Zero Waste Europe, all of whom have an active interest in questions relating to the way we can better manage materials to tackle environmental challenges.”
Food Waste gaining greater traction in the USA
“In a joint agency WasteExpo session, “Federal Food Loss and Waste Reduction Initiatives,” representatives from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), along with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), will shed light on a national strategy in the works that aims to reduce food loss and waste and promote organics recycling. They will touch on tools, resources, and funding available to address food loss and waste reduction and to improve food security, as well as more opportunities around the bend.”
Food Waste, BioEnergy & Anaerobic Digestion in the USA – Report
“The 2023 Billion-Ton Report is the fourth such assessment and was released by the DOE’s Bioenergy Technologies Office. The series of reports, first developed in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2005, estimates the availability of potential biomass resources and practices that can capture their value. The last report in this series was released in 2016.
The 2023 report found that there’s 1.1 to 1.5 billion tons of annual biomass production potential in the U.S. if all relevant resources are developed into mature markets. Those materials could cover about 15% of the country’s energy needs in the future. Newly developed energy from waste facilities, including anaerobic digesters, would be responsible for about a fifth of that potential, or about 217 million dry short tons. That projection takes into account several factors, including population growth influencing MSW streams over the next 20 years.”
David C. Wilson recalls past expertise to give future direction to Global Waste Management
“Improving waste and resource management around the world can halve the weight of plastics entering the oceans, significantly mitigate global heating and contribute directly to 12 of 17 SDGs. Achieving such results demands understanding and learning from the historical evolution of waste and resource management practices. [David C Wilson] has worked on policy, strategy and evidence for both municipal solid waste management (MSWM) and hazardous waste management worldwide through six decades; so have witnessed (and contributed to in a small way) the gradual stepwise evolution from a baseline of uncontrolled disposal to modern waste and resource management.”
Methane Assessment Platform (MAP) Launched
“The Waste Methane Assessment Platform, or WasteMAP, was created by RMI and Clean Air Task Force, with funding from the Global Methane Hub, to improve waste methane emissions transparency, and to highlight mitigation opportunities and best practices to reduce solid waste methane emissions.
By locating and quantifying sources of waste methane emissions, integrating data into a powerful and easy to use model for comparing different mitigation options, and providing resources for implementing mitigation strategies, WasteMAP gives policy makers and waste managers a unique tool to meet greenhouse gas reduction targets like the Global Methane Pledge.”
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