Bridging the Educational Gap in Circular Design and Engineering—An Educational Concept and Case Study from Austria

Abstract

Despite promising developments towards a circular economy, a recent study by EUROSTAT concluded that only 12% of EU’s economy is circular. One cause is suspected in particular in the fact that the scientific knowledge relating to the design and development of sustainable and recyclable products and processes has not arrived sufficiently in industrial practice. Educational offers for practitioners in circular design and engineering are still sparse and taken up hesitantly by companies in this context either. To close this educational gap, we have developed a particular training program for learning of Circular Design and Engineering principles. The development of the program was publicly funded and involved five industry partners from furniture and interiors industry. In this paper, we describe the underlying educational concept and lessons learned from a particular application of the concept in the Austrian furniture and interiors industry.