Implementing Industrial Ecology Ecoindustrial Park Developments in the USA and Europe

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Implementing Industrial Ecology? Eco-industrial
Park Developments in the USA and Europe
David Gibbs Department of Geography, University
of Hull d.c.gibbs_at_hull.ac.uk
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Eco-industrial Parks

• Cohen-Rosenthals (2003 19) defines an EIP as a
• community of businesses that co-operate with
  each other and with the local community to
  efficiently share resources (information,
  materials, water, energy, infrastructure and
  natural habitat)leading to economic gains, gains
  in environmental quality and equitable
  enhancement of human resources for the business
  and local community.

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Methodology

• Email, fax and telephone survey January-March
  2002
• 19 responses (14 operational, 5 planned)
• Case studies at 10 US sites and 6 European sites
• Total of 53 interviews with 63 individuals
• Field work USA July 2002 and December 2003
  Europe throughout 2003-2004

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US Sites
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European Sites
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Key Features of Industrial Ecology and Project
Research Questions
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EIPs as Industrial Ecology

• Absence of inter-firm exchanges and interactions,
  especially materials and energy interchanges
• Ecosite de Pays de Thau - sewage works, spin-out
  companies, marine micro-algae fed on sewage
  nutrients and processed
• Most IE synergies were potential
• Londonderry and Redhills Ecoplex - power plants
  as anchor tenants

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Closed Systems, Dynamism and Scale

• Closed Systems in the absence of IE closed
  systems, lock-in or path dependence were not
  problems
• Scale More fruitful to build on existing waste
  and energy interchanges - a local-regional
  industrial ecosystem
• Dynamism responses to change different from
  those envisaged in the literature. Instead,
  inhibition of tenant recruitment, abandonment of
  eco-industrial theme

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Trust and Co-operation between Participants

• Interactions other than materials or energy
  exchanges
• Interchange of personnel, co-operative
  purchasing, travel-to-work etc.
• Creating opportunities for cross-filtration of
  ideas, getting firms to meet and develop trust
• Trust and co-operation of importance for initial
  development and fund raising

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Local Collaboration and Partnership

• Having the right institutional setting in a
  region is among the most important elements for
  IS programmes and is an area where coordination
  bodies can make a contribution (Mirata, 2004
  970)
• Local collaboration and partnership of key
  importance
• Local government role in USA
• Management by pro-active institutions
• Important to catalyse new interactions or sustain
  existing ones

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Public Policy Intervention

• High levels of public sector involvement
• Part of local economic development strategies
• Ticking the environmental box?
• Long process of development

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EIPs as Sustainable Development

• Limited contribution to environmental aims
• Fossil fuels at Redhills Ecoplex and Londonderry
• Ground heat pump at Phillips Eco Enterprise
  Center, photovoltaic cells at Cape Charles and
  Eco Dyfi, wind turbine at Ecotech
• Improved economic performance
• A marketing device and unique selling point
• Lack of success leading to abandoning EIP
• Much depends on local economic context
• Social aims

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Future Prospects for IE and Eco-industrial Parks
as Policy Initiatives

• Large disparity between ideals and reality
• IE a defining feature of EIPs?
• Incremental approaches
• Importance of economic success
• Waste and energy exchange must be present to be
  IE or EIP
• Trust and co-operation
• Market or policy intervention?
• Local agencies as network brokers and
  institutional anchor tenants
• Local organisational cultures
• Spatial extent of firms operations
• Appropriate scale for IE projects?
• Structures and regulation must be appropriate