Cradle to Cradle Rethinking the way we make things By Dr. Monika Griefahn Santiago de Chile, November 13, 2013 1
The trash vortex of the North Pacific is an area the size of Central Europe. 2
Death in plastic soup The proof is found in the stomach of seabirds: plastic pollution of the oceans has now reached the Northwest coast of Canada, which until just recently was considered one of the last unpolluted coasts. A Team of scientists [ ] discovered plastic laces, Styrofoam, or plastic wrap in 92.5% of the 67 fulmars found dead on the beach. On average, 36.8 pieces of plastic were found per bird, and one even had 454 pieces in its stomach. Source: Süddeutsche Zeitung No. 153 from Thursday, July 5 th 2012, page 18 3
Environmental Disasters 4
In the European regions it takes 100 to 300 years to build a 1 cm layer of humus. 25 cm of humus is needed to have soil which is fertile enough to be used for food production. Every year we lose 4000 6000 times more humus than we build up. 5
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From cradle to grave 7
Indoor air pollution 8
Off-Gassing Cromatogram: Carpet (synthetic fiber) 9
Are we too many? are they too many? 4x biomass 10
Positive footprint 11
Effective and useful Absorbiert CO2 Produziert Sauerstoff Produziert Biomasse Unterstützt Biodiversität Stellt Lebensraum bereit Filtert die Luft Produziert Boden etc. 12
Biological Metabolism Technical Metabolism 13
Biological Nutrient 14
Offset-Printing innovated by gugler 15
Puma 16
Trigema 17
AVEDA 3R Reducir, Reutilizar, Reciclar Cradle to Cradle certified cosmetic products Biological cycle Packaging Technical cycle 18
Technical Nutrient 19
Steelcase 20
Desso 21
Philips-TV-set, produced with a high amount of recycled aluminium, with very few rare earth elements, without PVC, remote control working with solar energy 22
Buildings like trees, cities like forests 23
Ferrer Research & Development Center, Barcelona 24
1992 UNCED in Rio de Janeiro Opening of the first bionutrient recycling facility in Silva Jardim Rio+20 Hundreds of bionutrient recycling facilities operating in many countries 25
Bionutrient recycling in the favelas of Brasil, 1992 today 26
Haiti: bionutrient recycling structures survived 7.0 earthquake 27
Oia Instituto Ambiental Latin America Soil recovery Nutrient recycling Energy from Biomass Economic profitability Social justice 28
QUALITY OF NUTRIENTS Profitable nutrient recycling into crops Soil manufacturing QUALITY OF CURRENT SOLAR INCOME Energy from current biomass Sunlight purifies water Sun heats biodigesters QUALITY OF LIFE Conceptual diversity - innovation Cultural diversity - social justice Biodiversity - reforestation 29
www.epea.com www.c2ccertified.org Cradle to Cradle certification: EPEA Hamburg in cooperation with Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute in San Francisco 30
Not a pass/fail model, but concept of continuous improvement Five level system: Basic, Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum. The minimum level of achievement in any of the five categories ultimately determines the final certification level. 31
Four steps of certification Material Assessment: Requires declaration of all ingredients of a product - all chemicals and all CASnumbers (exception: basic level). Process Evaluation: Evaluation of the production process according to the criteria Renewable Energy, Social Fairness, Water Management Audit (done by C2CPII) Certificate (issued by C2CPII) 32
The product of Cradle to Cradle certification is assessed according to the following criteria: Material Health Reutilization in technical or biological metabolisms Energy strategies of production process Social policies Water strategy in production process 33
Incineration = waste of valueable nutrients like copper Germany: - slag of incineration contains 13.000 t copper/a (worth 100 mio. US-dollar/a) - Same time: theft of copper rain pipes from churches 34
Thank you! Monika Griefahn GmbH institut für medien umwelt kultur Postfach 1135 21231 Buchholz, Germany Tel.: + 49 4181 40 69262 E-Mail: office@griefahn.de Internet: www.monika-griefahn.de 35