Environmental Issues Elimination through Circular Economy

Environmental efforts of European Union are currently going towards circular economy. Tools like Extended Producer Responsibility and Eco-design were established. The circular economy deals with resources availability issue on one hand and waste management on the other hand. There are few pioneering companies all over the world with some kind of circular economy practice. Generally the concept is not very wide-spread. The paper aims to evaluate possibility of transition towards circular economy in Slovak industrial companies. They need to have an active approach to material treatment of their products after usage stage. Innovation is another important pre-condition for the transition. Main problem of current cradle to grave system is landfilling of valuable materials after one cycle of usage. Their potential value for next manufacturing cycles is lost. Companies may do not see connection between waste management and material resource prices and volatility of supplies. Municipalities are responsible for municipal waste collection and treatment in Slovakia. The circular economy operates by cradle to cradle principle. Company manages material flow until the material comes back to the beginning of manufacturing process by itself or by another partners. Stable material supplies with quite low costs are provided this way. It is necessary to deal with environmental problems in phase of product design. Questionnaire survey results show on one hand low involvement of industrial companies in waste management area, however on the other hand they are open to environmental innovations in future.