Abstract
The European Union (EU) has been working on building a circular economy (CE) since 2015. The CE concept aims to maximize resource utilization efficiency in various ways, mainly through the promotion of repair, sharing, and life extension as well as reuse and recycling. Although waste-to-energy (WtE) is positioned low in the waste hierarchy presented within the CE, WtE may still be effective for wastes that are difficult to sort and clean. Among EU countries, Austria shows one of the highest levels of waste material and energy use; a municipal waste flow analysis indicates that improvement of the sorting process may be the main contributing factor for this. In addition, effective WtE in the country has been realized by the management with Stadtwerke (city public corporation) and the existence of the regional heat supply network. Elements extracted from such cases in Australia will be an important reference for taking sustainable material cycles into consideration in other regions, including Japan.
