This article
- provides you with news from the Chinese-Austrian cooperation project CircularityOptimizer regarding an integration methodology for circular-enabling technologies in industrial-urban symbioses
- and includes an invitation to participate in the webinar Industrial-Urban Symbioses: From Coexistence to Cooperation on September 25, 2025, hosted by project partner AEE INTEC and featuring participation from akaryon.
Making the circular economy ecologically and socially fair through the smart linking of technologies in cities and industry
Which technology elevates a local technology network to a new level in terms of energy savings, economic benefits, and social added value? With which enabler technologies does a region achieve closed loops? Which tech-power combination makes a city resilient?
A promising concept for promoting the circular economy is the development of industrial-urban symbioses (IUS). By linking material, energy, and water flows between urban and industrial actors, synergies can be utilized, waste reduced, and loops closed. (More on this in a paper on the CircularityOptimizer project.)
CircularityOptimizer: Technology catalog, impact calculation, and visualization for participatory development of circular scenarios
The innovation CircularityOptimizer, which has been significantly developed over recent months, follows this approach. The instrument supports the systematic identification, evaluation, and integration of technologies for closing cycles into concrete application scenarios.
Decision and interpretation support
The CircularityOptimizer is a decision support tool: With which technology constellations can circularity goals be achieved in an area? It is also a tool for interpreting key figures that define an area: What circularity performance is being achieved in a territory?
For stakeholders with different professional backgrounds
The CircularityOptimizer makes solutions for problems in circular technology integration quickly and clearly graspable and negotiable for stakeholders with different professional backgrounds, leading to a fact-based consensus.
Indicator system also integrates social impact
The indicator system encompasses technical, ecological, and economic impacts, as well as social impact. It is based on the EU monitoring framework for the circular economy, which reflects aspects such as social inclusion and IUS-specific energy indicators. In addition to classic effects like energy and water savings and direct CO2 emissions, indirect emissions and societal effects on various groups, including vulnerable ones, are measurable in person-hours, along with gender sensitivity.
Among the socially effective parameters specifically defined for the CircularityOptimizer by those responsible to drive positive societal impact in planning are the level of digitalization, general noise pollution, and the proportion of areas that are sufficiently illuminated.
Quick data capture is just as possible as acquiring detailed knowledge
There is the option of a “Quick Snoop” evaluation in S / M / L, as well as educationally prepared detailed information to build awareness among process participants.
Core elements of the CircularityOptimizer, an integration methodology for circular-enabling technologies in industrial-urban symbioses
Technology Catalog:
Finding suitable technologies for symbiotic technology networks
The framework integrates a modularly structured digital technology catalog. This is linked to a multidimensional assessment system: based on ESG criteria (Environment, Social, Governance), comprehensive sustainability assessments of technology scenarios can be carried out using even a rough dataset, allowing symbiotic options for technology integration into scenarios to be derived.
ESG Data Management and Reporting Tool:
Analyzing objects based on general key figures and individual data
Functioning cycles benefit from a comprehensive evaluation of technology matches according to principles that go beyond environmental and economic aspects and also consider social and governance factors—this is where the linking of the methodology with the ESG management and reporting software ESG-Cockpit plays a special role.
Through interfaces to the ESG-Cockpit, integration into individual data landscapes is efficiently possible—on the market for 10 years, the tool already supports thousands of users from companies, organizations, public institutions, and municipal administrations in Austria, Germany, and internationally, using it for compliance with standards such as ESRS, VSME, EMAS, Economy for the Common Good, and SDGs.
The ESG-Cockpit functions as an algorithm engine: Numerous KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) on the subject of the circular economy are already stored, but custom ones can also be defined (including for other sustainability topics), along with individual calculation logics. The impact analysis algorithm is adaptable to various stakeholder requirements.
Participation Method and Visualization Tool:
Seeing objects in interaction and changing constellations participatively
Interfaces to the decision support as well as city and regional planning platform URBAN MENUS enable 3D representation and collaborative adjustment of technology match scenarios until the desired result is achieved.
Unlike pure planning software, scenario reflection here is interdisciplinarily understandable in multi-stakeholder contexts; unlike gamification software or simulation games, it still works with real data and visualizes based on it. Technical parameters are linked not only with ESG criteria but also with stakeholder interests.
In the long term, the framework can be integrated as a basis for decision-making into other digital planning environments, opening up various fields of application.
Application Examples
Deployment in Austria – Technology integration for a wastewater treatment plant
In Austria, in collaboration with AEE INTEC, a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) in Gleisdorf (Styria) was chosen as the starting point for circular technology integration.
The image shows the Gleisdorf application area around the WWTP
Based on extensive research and assessment work, a range of tailored technologies was selected to maximize synergy effects in energy, water, and nutrient cycles, also providing benefits for the local population. Examples include systems in the areas of heat pumps, combined heat and power, photovoltaics, membrane distillation, and phosphorus recovery.
Deployment in China – Regenerative renovation of a former industrial site
In China, in cooperation with ARTS Group, considered the first green building design firm from Suzhou, the Carbon 12 Workshop project in Kunshan, Suzhou (Jiangsu Province) was selected as the starting point for technology integration—a project for the regenerative renovation of a former industrial site. Here, the integration of photovoltaics with air-source heat pumps, rainwater harvesting, and greywater recycling systems, as well as energy monitoring and management systems, was investigated to optimize energy flows and identify surpluses.
The development of the innovation CircularityOptimizer is funded within the framework of a bilateral TECXPORT RTI call, managed by the Austrian Research Promotion Agency FFG in collaboration with the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology MOST.
The internationally renowned architect and urban/regional planner Laura P. Spinadel (BUSarchitektur) leads the project. The environmental informatics company akaryon with its flagship ESG-Cockpit and the Institute for Sustainable Technologies AEE INTEC, which has major responsibility for the CircularityOptimizer’s technology catalog, are Austrian project partners. Laura P. Spinadel and akaryon have been working together for nearly 10 years on the innovation URBAN MENUS – the CircularityOptimizer is a follow-up innovation.
On the Chinese side, ARTS Group Co.,Ltd. holds the lead—the company is considered the first architectural firm specializing in green building design from Suzhou (Jiangsu Province). Research and economic partners are Jiangsu Langyi Environmental Technology Co., Ltd and the Research Institute for Environmental Innovation (RIET).
Petra Busswald from akaryon on September 25, 2025, as a keynote speaker in the webinar “Industrial-Urban Symbioses”, hosted by CircularityOptimizer project partner AEE INTEC
Fittingly, there is also a webinar in September hosted by CircularityOptimizer project partner AEE INTEC. In this context, Petra Busswald from akaryon will also be speaking.
Webinar: Industrial-Urban Symbioses: From Coexistence to Cooperation
- Date: Thursday, 09/25/2025
- Time: 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM
- Location: Online
- The event will be held in German
- Participation is free of charge
The focus is on rethinking value chains through synergies between companies, industries, and sectors in industrial-urban symbioses. Examples will be presented and discussed interactively with participants.