Chair of CEA, Takashi Nakamura, and Director of CEA, Kotaro Shimizu, authored a section of the Science Council of Japan Report titled “Academic Challenges for Enabling Resource Circulation in the Circular Economy.”

Director Kotaro Shimizu, together with the Chair (Prof. Keiko Sasaki, Waseda University) and Vice Chair (Prof. Kazuki Morita, the University of Tokyo at the time) of the committee that deliberated on the report (the Joint Subcommittee on Resource and Material Recycling for the Circular Economy, comprising the Committee on Materials Engineering, the Committee on Environmental Science, and the Committee on General Engineering), contributed to reviewing the report’s structure and finalizing the document.

This report identifies and summarizes key academic challenges necessary to stay on the path toward the circular economy, including social systems supporting the logistics of end-of-life products, standardization of products and/or materials’ value, technological improvement for circular actions, and product and material design for circularity.

Since it is difficult to devise solutions to social issues stemming from resource depletion from the perspective of science and engineering alone, deliberations were conducted from the perspectives of economics, law, sociology, and environmental studies to identify new challenges and approaches.

In Japan, a country with limited natural resources, this report is expected to serve as a guide for realizing a circular economy, inform academic policy, and lead to concrete measures and budgetary provisions by relevant government ministries, universities, and other research and educational institutions, as well as contribute to higher education based on the comprehensive knowledge of universities and other institutions.

The report can be viewed below.

Report: Academic Challenges for Enabling Resource Circulation in the Circular Economy (Only available in Japanese)