Lucy Shields, of WRc (http://www.wrcplc.co.uk/), gave an enlightening talk on “Recovering the Value of Resources” (at the UTC 9th Dec). Personally I hadn’t come across the concept of a circular economy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_economy) prior to the event and the work the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/), established in September 2010, is doing to drive that. It’s certainly an ambitious and worthy goal. It was encouraging to hear that Swindon is making good strives in this direction through for example the development of its Solid Recovered Fuel Plant (http://swindoncommercialservices.co.uk/services/solid-recovered-fuel-plant). 
The talk highlighted that there are many future challenges to overcome to achieve a truly circular economy. There were also many questions after Lucy’s talk and I’m sure there are more that folks have thought of since the event. Lucy has kindly agreed to contribute to this discussion thread, so please take the opportunity to raise further thoughts and questions here.