Industrial Symbiosis Networks (ISNs) consist of firms that exchange residual materials and energy locally, in order to gain economic, environmental and/or social advantages. In practice, ISNs regularly fail when partners leave and the recovery of residual streams ends. Regarding the current societal need for a shift towards sustainability, it is undesirable that ISNs should fail. Failures of ISNs may be caused by actor behaviour that leads to unanticipated economic losses. In this paper, we explore the effect of these behaviours on ISN robustness by using an agent-based model (ABM). The constructed model is based on insights from both literature and participatory modelling in three real-world cases. It simulates the implementation of synergies for local waste exchange and compost production. The Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) was used to model agent behaviour in time-dependent bilateral negotiations and synergy evaluation processes. We explored model behaviour with and without TPB logic across a range of possible TPB input variables. The simulation results show how the modelled planned behaviour affects the cash flow outcomes of the social agents and the robustness of the network. The study contributes to the theoretical development of industrial symbiosis research by providing a quantitative model of all ISN implementation stages, in which various behavioural patterns of entrepreneurs are included. It also contributes to practice by offering insights on how network dynamics and robustness outcomes are not only related to context and ISN design, but also to actor behaviour.
The key role of Restructing Agencies in achieving high private investments and creating employment. Effective revitalization leads to economically vital and future proof industrial parks. This short paper tells how revitalization can be effectively performed. Preliminary results are presented of a four year study of the Restructuring Agency of Overijssel, active in revitalization in the Province of Overijssel in the Netherlands. The study identifies, presents and reflects on the effectiveness of working methods used by the restructuring agency in seven revitalization projects of industrial parks. The value of continuously focusing on willingness to invest is identified as a key working method and success factor. Other working methods illustrate the importance and effectiveness of goal-oriented choices that aim at snowball effects, the use of dynamic opportunity maps, choosing own role based on complementarity, always developing business cases that contribute to value cases, and managing the important relationship between effective working methods and capability of individuals and organizations. Ongoing research aims at further underpinning provisional conclusions about the use and effectiveness of working methods, and the development of a toolbox for practitioners that will contain and integrate capability profiles, working methods, and the related change management approach.
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Corporate reputation is becoming increasingly important for firms; social media platforms such as Twitter are used to convey their message. In this paper, corporate reputation will be assessed from a sustainability perspective. Using sentiment analysis, the top 100 brands of the Netherlands were scraped and analyzed. The companies were registered in the sustainable industry classification system (SICS) to perform the analysis on an industry level. A semantic search tool called Open Semantic Desktop Search was used to filter through the data to find keywords related to sustainability and corporate reputation. Findings show that companies that tweet more often about corporate reputation and sustainability receive overall a more positive sentiment from the public.
Denim Democracy from the Alliance for Responsible Denim (ARD) is an interactive exhibition that celebrates the journey and learning of ARD members, educates visitors about sustainable denim and highlights how companies collaborate together to achieve results. Through sight, sound and tactile sensations, the visitor experiences and fully engages sustainable denim production. The exhibition launches in October 2018 in Amsterdam and travels to key venues and locations in the Netherlands until April 2019. As consumers, we love denim but the denim industry, like other sub-sectors in the textile, apparel and footwear industries, faces many complex sustainability challenges and has been criticized for its polluting and hazardous production practices. The Alliance for Responsible Denim project brought leading denim brands, suppliers and stakeholders together to collectively address these issues and take initial steps towards improving the ecological sustainability impact of denim production. Sustainability challenges are considered very complex and economically undesirable for individual companies to address alone. In denim, small and medium sized denim firms face specific challenges, such as lower economies of scale and lower buying power to affect change in practices. There is great benefit in combining denim companies' resources and knowledge so that collective experimentation and learning can lift the sustainability standards of the industry and lead to the development of common standards and benchmarks on a scale that matters. If meaningful, transformative industrial change is to be made, then it calls for collaboration between denim industry stakeholders that goes beyond supplier-buyer relations and includes horizontal value chain collaboration of competing large and small denim brands. However collaboration between organizations, and especially between competitors, is highly complex and prone to failure. The research behind the Alliance for Responsible Denim project asked a central research question: how do competitors effectively collaborate together to create common, industry standards on resource use and benchmarks for improved ecological sustainability? To answer this question, we used a mixed-method, action research approach. The Alliance for Responsible Denim project mobilized and facilitated denim brands to collectively identify ways to reduce the use of water and chemicals in denim production and then aided them to implement these practices individually in their respective firms.
Due to the existing pressure for a more rational use of the water, many public managers and industries have to re-think/adapt their processes towards a more circular approach. Such pressure is even more critical in the Rio Doce region, Minas Gerais, due to the large environmental accident occurred in 2015. Cenibra (pulp mill) is an example of such industries due to the fact that it is situated in the river basin and that it has a water demanding process. The current proposal is meant as an academic and engineering study to propose possible solutions to decrease the total water consumption of the mill and, thus, decrease the total stress on the Rio Doce basin. The work will be divided in three working packages, namely: (i) evaluation (modelling) of the mill process and water balance (ii) application and operation of a pilot scale wastewater treatment plant (iii) analysis of the impacts caused by the improvement of the process. The second work package will also be conducted (in parallel) with a lab scale setup in The Netherlands to allow fast adjustments and broaden evaluation of the setup/process performance. The actions will focus on reducing the mill total water consumption in 20%.
Nederland kent ongeveer 220.000 bedrijfsongevallen per jaar (met 60 mensen die overlijden). Vandaar dat elke werkgever verplicht is om bedrijfshulpverlening (BHV) te organiseren, waaronder BHV-trainingen. Desondanks brengt slechts een-derde van alle bedrijven de arbeidsrisico’s in kaart via een Risico-Inventarisatie & Evaluatie (RI&E) en blijft het aandeel werknemers met een arbeidsongeval hoog. Daarom wordt er continu geïnnoveerd om BHV-trainingen te optimaliseren, o.a. door middel van Virtual Reality (VR). VR is niet nieuw, maar is wel doorontwikkeld en betaalbaarder geworden. VR biedt de mogelijkheid om veilige realistische BHV-noodsimulaties te ontwikkelen waarbij de cursist het gevoel heeft daar echt te zijn. Ondanks de toename in VR-BHV-trainingen, is er weinig onderzoek gedaan naar het effect van VR in BHV-trainingen en zijn resultaten tegenstrijdig. Daarnaast zijn er nieuwe technologische ontwikkelingen die het mogelijk maken om kijkgedrag te meten in VR m.b.v. Eye-Tracking. Tijdens een BHV-training kan met Eye-Tracking gemeten worden hoe een instructie wordt opgevolgd, of cursisten worden afgeleid en belangrijke elementen (gevaar en oplossingen) waarnemen tijdens de simulatie. Echter, een BHV-training met VR en Eye-Tracking (interacties) bestaat niet. In dit project wordt een prototype ontwikkeld waarin Eye-Tracking wordt verwerkt in een 2021 ontwikkelde VR-BHV-training, waarin noodsituaties zoals een kantoorbrand worden gesimuleerd (de BHVR-toepassing). Door middel van een experiment zal het prototype getest worden om zo voor een deel de vraag te beantwoorden in hoeverre en op welke manier Eye-Tracking in VR een meerwaarde biedt voor (RI&E) BHV-trainingen. Dit project sluit daarmee aan op het missie-gedreven innovatiebeleid ‘De Veiligheidsprofessional’ en helpt het MKB dat vaak middelen en kennis ontbreekt voor onderzoek naar effectiviteit rondom innovatieve-technologieën in educatie/training. Het project levert onder meer een prototype op, een productie-rapport en onderzoeks-artikel, en staat open voor nieuwe deelnemers bij het schrijven van een grotere aanvraag rondom de toepassing en effect van VR en Eye-Tracking in BHV-trainingen.
