Short answer
When evaluating or designing for circularity, prioritize metrics that provide a holistic view of environmental, economic, and social impacts across the entire product lifecycle, actively seeking to avoid burden shifting.
- Field
- Sustainability
- Source
- Resources Conservation and Recycling (2019)
- Method
- Literature review and critical assessment
- Evidence
- Strong effect
Current metrics for measuring the circularity of products and services often fail to capture the full environmental, economic, and social impacts, potentially leading to undesirable burden shifts rather than genuine sustainable development. This sustainability research insight is drawn from a 2019 study published in Resources Conservation and Recycling. Using Literature review and critical assessment, researchers explored how this design variable affects real-world outcomes. The key design takeaway: When evaluating or designing for circularity, prioritize metrics that provide a holistic view of environmental, economic, and social impacts across the entire product lifecycle, actively seeking to avoid burden shifting.
Circularity Metrics Must Account for Burden Shifting to Ensure True Sustainability
Current metrics for measuring the circularity of products and services often fail to capture the full environmental, economic, and social impacts, potentially leading to undesirable burden shifts rather than genuine sustainable development.
Resources Conservation and Recycling · 2019
Key Findings
- 01Existing circularity metrics are diverse but often incomplete, failing to address the circular economy concept in its entirety.
- 02Many metrics can lead to undesirable burden shifting, where improvements in one area are offset by negative impacts in others (environmental, economic, or social).
- 03Current metrics often under-represent the complexities of multiple product lifecycles and the consequences of material downcycling.
- 04There is a need for comprehensive metrics that clearly allocate benefits between primary and secondary products to avoid misleading sustainability claims.
Application
Design takeaway
When evaluating or designing for circularity, prioritize metrics that provide a holistic view of environmental, economic, and social impacts across the entire product lifecycle, actively seeking to avoid burden shifting.
How to apply
When developing a new product or service, use a multi-criteria assessment tool that considers resource depletion, waste generation, energy consumption, social equity, and economic viability across all lifecycle stages, rather than relying on a single circularity score.
Project actions
- 01When choosing metrics for your design project, explain why you selected them and acknowledge their limitations.
- 02Consider how your design choices might shift burdens to other parts of the lifecycle or to different stakeholders.
- 03Look for case studies that discuss the challenges of implementing circular economy principles and measuring success.
Method & Evidence
Variables
Strengths & Limitations
Strengths
- +Provides a critical review of a broad range of existing metrics.
- +Clearly articulates the problem of burden shifting in circularity assessment.
- +Offers recommendations for future metric development.
Limitations
It can be difficult to find data for all aspects of a product's lifecycle, making a truly comprehensive assessment challenging. Different stakeholders may also have different priorities, leading to disagreements on what constitutes 'sustainable'.
Reliability & validity
The validity of the assessment relies on the authors' critical interpretation of the literature and their predefined requirements for CE metrics. Reliability is enhanced by the systematic review process.
Think critically
If a product is marketed as 'highly circular' based on a specific metric, what other factors should a consumer or designer consider to ensure it is truly sustainable?
Design Principles
"Holistic circularity assessment requires accounting for all lifecycle impacts to prevent burden shifting and ensure genuine sustainability."
For designers and engineers, this highlights the critical need to move beyond simplistic 'recyclability' or 'recycled content' metrics. A comprehensive understanding of a product's lifecycle impact is essential to avoid unintended negative consequences and to truly contribute to a circular economy that aligns with broader sustainability goals.
What This Means for Your Design
When you measure how 'circular' something is, make sure you look at all the effects. Just because you recycle something doesn't mean it's good for the planet if it uses way more energy or causes other problems.
How to use in your project
- 1.Reference this research when discussing the limitations of chosen metrics or when justifying the selection of a more comprehensive assessment framework for your design project.
- 2.Use the concept of burden shifting to critically evaluate the sustainability claims of existing products or proposed design solutions.
Add to My Project
Quick Cite
Paragraph starter
This research highlights the critical need to move beyond simplistic circularity metrics that may obscure unintended consequences. As noted by Corona et al. (2019), 'New circularity metrics are being developed... but they often present contradiction in both form and content, which contributes to confusion and misunderstanding of the CE concept.' Therefore, for this design project, a holistic assessment approach has been adopted, considering not only material recirculation but also energy inputs, waste outputs, and potential social impacts across the entire product lifecycle to avoid burden shifting and ensure genuine sustainability.
Source
Resources Conservation and Recycling
Towards sustainable development through the circular economy—A review and critical assessment on current circularity metrics
journal · 2019
View sourceQuestions About This Research
- What does the research say about circularity metrics must account for burden shifting to ensure true sustainability?
- When evaluating or designing for circularity, prioritize metrics that provide a holistic view of environmental, economic, and social impacts across the entire product lifecycle, actively seeking to avoid burden shifting. Evidence: Resources Conservation and Recycling (2019).
- Why does "Circularity Metrics Must Account for Burden Shifting to Ensure True Sustainability" matter for design?
- For designers and engineers, this highlights the critical need to move beyond simplistic 'recyclability' or 'recycled content' metrics. A comprehensive understanding of a product's lifecycle impact is essential to avoid unintended negative consequences and to truly contribute to a circular economy that aligns with broader sustainability goals.
- How can designers apply this research?
- When evaluating or designing for circularity, prioritize metrics that provide a holistic view of environmental, economic, and social impacts across the entire product lifecycle, actively seeking to avoid burden shifting.
- What were the main findings?
- Existing circularity metrics are diverse but often incomplete, failing to address the circular economy concept in its entirety.. Many metrics can lead to undesirable burden shifting, where improvements in one area are offset by negative impacts in others (environmental, economic, or social).. Current metrics often under-represent the complexities of multiple product lifecycles and the consequences of material downcycling.. There is a need for comprehensive metrics that clearly allocate benefits between primary and secondary products to avoid misleading sustainability claims.
- What research method was used?
- Literature review and critical assessment.
- How strong is the evidence?
- Evidence strength is rated Strong effect, based on a 2019 journal from Resources Conservation and Recycling.
- What should I do differently in my next project?
- When developing a new product or service, use a multi-criteria assessment tool that considers resource depletion, waste generation, energy consumption, social equity, and economic viability across all lifecycle stages, rather than relying on a single circularity score.
- What are the limitations?
- The review is based on existing literature, and the development of new, more comprehensive metrics is ongoing. The practical implementation of complex metrics can also be challenging.