The Kuwait Environment Protection Society participated in the “Environmental and Social Governance and Sustainability” conference held in Los Angeles, USA, through the participation of Engineer Yousef Al-Ramzi, the official spokesperson and member of the Society’s environmental engineers team, in order to learn about the models and developments of the “circular economy” as a new concept for sustainable development.
M. Al-Ramzi said that “the conference is the first of its kind to bring together companies, government and society to address environmental problems in the city of Los Angeles and the state of California,” noting that “the conference witnessed broad participation from representatives of various entities, including global companies showcasing their projects that are compatible with the circular economy, which is the design of any object, whether a building, tool or goods, based on the possibility of recycling it after the end of its use,” explaining that “in the science of the circular economy, the product, service or resource is renewed or recycled instead of being wasted, when a product or resource is used it is recycled, or turned into compost, or reused in a way that allows it to return to a new life cycle or a new supply chain.”.
He added, “As an example, the Department of Sanitation and Environment in the city of Los Angeles recycled and reused materials from a previously demolished building for other uses, which led to a rethinking of building design and construction standards. This then led to the development of circular economy technology where every piece is recycled. In short, the benefit of this conference is to learn about a new concept of sustainable development, its examples, and how we can apply it in the State of Kuwait.”.
Mr. Yousef Al-Ramzi noted, “As an example, designing a single building that includes offices and parking spaces. This idea is very useful because it reduces waste and provides flexibility to use the floor equally as parking spaces and offices, or for parking entirely, or entirely for offices. This does not incur the costs of changing the building's layout in the future for the implementing company, reduces waste resulting from demolition and reconstruction costs, and inevitably reduces the use of new resources.”.
Al-Ramzi considered that “one of the benefits of this conference is to guide companies and governments towards thinking about the future in another way, which is how to recycle products and make the most of them before they are manufactured, especially since construction waste and debris occupy large areas of landfills and constitute an obstacle to their rehabilitation. Therefore, today we must study and research the special requirements for projects to implement this type of circular economy to reduce waste and preserve natural resources.“.
