Circular economy hubs in peripheral urban centres in Central Europe
CITYCIRCLE is improving innovation capacities of peripheral urban centers of Central Europe  by introducing the circular economy system to partner cities. Peripheral cities of Central Europe are marked by lack of innovation cooperation and lack of access to global innovation processes. Circular economy (CE) has been acknowledged as a development concept that should provide sustainable, resource efficient development and a great pool for innovation of new technologies, services, solutions and business models (EU Action Plan “Closing the loop”) to make our cities and regions better places to live and work. The main CITYCIRCLE objective is to utilize innovation potential of circular economy in cities through 1) setting-up quadruple-helix circular economy hubs in partner cities and to 2) equip them with the knowledge and tools so they will be able to design circular economy value-chains in their cities. Hubs will implement 3) pilot projects in the framework of respective S3 strategies to test developed tools, while 4) transnational value chains (supported by transnational marketplace for materials) will be defined in transnational CE strategy (transnational S3 implementation) to link local circular economy value chains and reach critical mass.
Transnational approach will provide transnational value chains, critical mass of target materials and knowledge to enable business cases for the main target groups - SMEs, industries, environmental service providers, while cities (citizens) will benefit from more efficient resource and waste management.
Deployment of circular economy system in cities is innovative approach itself as well as full circular economy package for cities provided by CITYCIRCLE - organizational structures, knowledge and tools, transnational value chains.