CircularizatE

Group of students, faculty members and staff @Industriales aiming at implementing the Circular Economy principles (and strategy) in their centre and beyond. The strategic work lines for this group are described here. (cf Figure 1, pp. 138, https://www.mincotur.gob.es/Publicaciones/Publicacionesperiodicas/EconomiaIndustrial/RevistaEconomiaIndustrial/416/CARRASCO,%20YA%CC%81N%CC%83EZ,%20MARTI%CC%81NEZ%20%20y%20J%20MARTI%CC%81NEZ.pdf) The last achievements include:

• Collaboration with the Centre Administration to introduce the sustainable public purchasing practices (SDG LO 12-B-2). In particular, this year we have worked in the RFP requirements for toner purchasing and cafeteria services in the centre. Particularly, the new RFP emphasize on reducing single-use packaging in the centre and waste management metrics.
• Improvements and baseline studies on centre waste management: waste management suppliers mapping, research on downstream recycling operations after collection, paper recovery in the centre (door-to-door collection service), launch organic fraction separate collection.
• Supplier development initiative, particularly with cleaning service and cafeteria, training and support on working procedures that make our centre more sustainable.
• Design, implementation and operation of our Circular FabLab, a unique initiative of its kind, which has collected more than 10 kg of rejected PLA from the Coronamakers movement.
• All this collected PLA has been fully recycled by CircularizatE students: manual separation by colors and qualities, first manual shredding (using hammers, scissors, etc.), shredding, drying, extrusion. The recycled 3D printing filament is 100% recycled PLA, which constitutes a technical milestone. The procedure is “artisanal” and somehow labor intensive, and it is managed and developed mostly by students using a permanence in the lab system.
• Technical evaluation and characterization of recycled PLA and other polymers (relevant chemical engineering processes)
• Development of a procedure for plastics classification using densities (water, salted water, and oil), used in outreach and scientific diffusion activities, such as Semana de la Ciencia.
• Design of communication materials
• Social networks management: @circularizate
• Achievement of funds for assets purchasing (lab machines) through the participation in students in challenges and contests such as the Ford Community Challenge (Apadrina la Ciencia) or the Fundación Vodafone Project Lab.

The group meets quarterly (1 hour-meetings) under an internal organization structure in functional departments, each of them with its own Teams channel, besides the General channel. Students had been trained in lean and agile project management techniques to self-sufficiently advance in the project guided by staff and faculty members. The activity is included in the ETSII catalogue as “Antenas de sostenibilidad” (pp.10) with an ECTS recognition ranging from 0.5 to 1.5 ECTS (https://www.etsii.upm.es/estudios/grados/doc/CatalogoEspecificoETSIICompleto2020-21.pdf)