Mette Mosgaard

Understanding the role of waste prevention in local waste management: A literature review

Local waste management has so far been characterised by end-of-pipe solutions, landfilling, incineration, and recycling. End-of-pipe solutions build on a different mind-set than life cycle-based approaches, and for this reason, local waste managers are reluctant to consider strategies for waste prevention. To accelerate the transition of waste and resource management towards a more integrated management, waste prevention needs to play a larger role in the local waste management. In this review article, we collect knowledge from the scientific community on waste prevention of relevance to local waste management. We analyse the trends in the waste prevention literature by organising the literature into four categories. The results indicate an increasing interest in waste prevention, but not much literature specifically concerns the integration of prevention into the local waste management. However, evidence from the literature can inform local waste management on the prevention potential; the environmental and social effects of prevention; how individuals in households can be motivated to reduce waste; and how the effects of prevention measures can be monitored. Nevertheless, knowledge is still lacking on local waste prevention, especially regarding the methods for monitoring and how local waste management systems can be designed to encourage waste reduction in the households. We end the article with recommendations for future research. The literature review can be useful for both practitioners in the waste sector and for academics seeking an overview of previous research on waste prevention.

Making carbon-fibre composite ferries a competitive alternative: the institutional challenges

Public policies and governmental structures are expected to provide incentives for a sustainable development, but some structures are developed for different purposes and instead create barriers to new innovations. In the case of small displacement island ferries in European waters, the institutional settings favour less sustainable solutions, namely steel designs, although lighter alternatives in carbon-fibre composites are available. Network collaboration can be seen as a method for actors to overcome barriers to the development of a new technology. This paper shows how a number of small actors in a network develop capabilities to overcome institutional barriers in the ferry sector in order to get the eco-innovations on the market. The analysis shows that the network changes the institutional setting for the new technology in a manner in which the individual actors would not be able to change it themselves.

The function of intermediaries in collaborative innovation processes: retrofitting a Danish small island ferry with green technology

Intermediaries are actors who perform several functions during innovation processes such as brokering and networking. In this paper, the aim is to analyse how intermediaries support collaborative innovation processes taking place in green maritime technology projects. In particular, retrofit projects related to cleaner technologies and small vessels are an understudied subject. The case study of a Danish small island ferry retrofit shows that intermediaries are important to stage the collaboration between actors. They can provide functions to the incipient network as foresight, brokering, increasing network connectivity and scanning of information. However, intermediaries can also have a proactive role in shaping the emerging innovation pathways. In this case study, intermediaries negotiate each partners role and define the goals of the project. The results contribute to the broader eco-innovation literature by analysing intermediation in innovation in a process perspective.

Light Island Ferries in Scandinavia: A Case of Radical Eco-innovation

This chapter shows how a radically new technology can be developed. Through a case study based on interviews and action research, this chapter deals with displacement island ferries in European waters where a radical innovation is made in the shift from steel designs to a lighter carbon-fiber composite alternative. A key characteristic for eco-innovation is that it combines techniques, practices, and knowledge across existing boundaries. Networking and collaboration therefore become important for creating ideas and implementing these in order to get the environmental innovations on the market. The analysis focuses on three main principles that together constitute the radical change in the technology, namely, (1) light construction inspired from yacht racing; (2) to leave ashore what is not needed at sea, also adopted from yacht racing; and (3) to make a modular design that makes the use of the ferries more flexible, which is adopted from the naval sector. The case study shows how new actors on the market create this radical innovation and build a network to support the solution. The new actors, even though they are to some degree competitors, have chosen to collaborate and to access the ferry sector, a sector that they have not previously targeted as their primary sector. The actors have experience with carbon composite technology and are not fixed by a production based on steel. This allows them to introduce this technology as a disruptive innovation that challenges and changes the way ferries are produced.