Toward the Circular Economy: An Initial Analysis Framework

The growing relevance of circular economy (as an approach that can help both to improve the competitiveness of the organizations that apply it, and the future quality of life on Earth) has strongly increased the awareness of companies and academics regarding this subject. This paper tries to identify the bases of a circular economy model that attempts to capture and measure the key elements that organizations should include when formulating their strategy to attain a certain level of circularity. This model could also form the basis for establishing a comprehensive “circularity” assessment system of the level achieved by a certain organization that is still a gap in research. This research seeks to establish a preliminary model as the basis to start the study of its application to several processes of three companies (two Spanish and one European multinational), with the aim of verifying to what extent their processes are aligned with the so-called “circular economy” objectives, as they are described in the mentioned proposed model.