MAIN TAKEAWAYS

• Renewable energy can be produced by photovoltaic cells in buildings.
• Electric cars can also be connected to a smart grid, as an energy buffer. Waste heat from offices can be used to heat apartments.
• In terms of water, flows can be infiltrated through parks and collective green areas, bioswales can collect and slowly release rainwater, and it can even be possible to manage wastewater by treating it in wastelands, eventually directing it to rivers and lakes.
• Waste can have different collective approaches. Local repair shops can stimulate longer use of products; containers for waste collection and waste separation can also optimize the flows.
• At an even larger scale, transportation can also play an important role. Good quality of public transportation, bicycle, and pedestrian routes can serve as reduction in use of private cars, and reduce CO2 emissions. Through larger heat networks, there can also be heat exchange.

We see that our three key resource flows appear in different ways in neighbourhoods and cities and that there are many opportunities for making them more circular.

In the animations we looked at an average Dutch city. In other cities, the same flows may look very different.