5.3 Practical Challenges for Realizing Benefits in a Circular Economy 117
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A third sub-category the results of the case study analysis revealed is technological
limitations. As the concept of circular economy is fairly new, organizations and
suppliers have limited time to develop substitutes for the materials they use in the
production process of their conventional products. Currently, organizations have to
deal with many limitations regarding the availability of circulatable resources. Case
Eta encountered an obstacle when the material currently available for biodegrad-
able products did not fall into their core business. This prevented the organization
from investing in this technology altogether: “... but the kind of material which is
available, Cradle-to-Cradle certified, for yarns and other material which can be made
out of it is limited to a certain product range” (see Appendix: German Quote 46).
Circular economy requires that reusable products in the technical cycle beleft undyed because it is impossible to make dyed polyester white again. This is a
serious limitation and prevents organizations from meeting customers’ demands
for colored clothes. For the organization in case Delta, this limitation led to the
decision not to implement products belonging to the technical cycle in the first
place as explained here: “Of course there is an idea to keep products in the material
cycle forever but this is only possible if we leave them ‘untouched’ e.g. without any
color. This would be a major limitation for us and that is the reason why I think that
the technical cycle might be difficult to implement” (see Appendix: German Quote
24). Other organizations are unable to fulfill customers’ requirements for a special
color because there isn’t a huge variety of colors available as in case Beta: “We are
not able to offer all colors, e.g. in the case of police uniforms, a certain blue and a
certain red is required, and both are not part of the Cradle-to-Cradle color palette”
(see Appendix: German Quote 72). Other cases, such as case Gamma, invested in the
production of a circular product but were not able to source adequate substitutes
for certain materials, limiting them in further improving their product towards
closing the loop and improving its toxicity-level.
More research is necessary to further understand material toxicity-levels andinnovation is required to create products with low toxicity-level. Without innovation
and improving the availability of substitutes, organizations won’t be able to pursue
their commitment to a circular economy. However, case Zeta is positive that this
challenge can be solved in the future, as stated by the interviewee: “And I am hopeful
that humanity with all its creativity, and also we with our technologies from the field
of plastic recycling, will find adequate technologies that will facilitate recycling and
keeping material in the cycle” (see Appendix: German Quote 73).
The fourth sub-category is the missing economies of scale of circulatable material.This is challenging for organizations because the low production volumes increase
the cost per unit. If the material is more expensive per unit, the price of the final
product increases. This reduces the potential group of buyers and consequently