The circular economy of food waste: Transforming waste to energy through ‘make-up’ work

Abstract

This article unpacks the neat straightforwardness of the ‘waste regime’ of the circular economy of food waste and its main idea: ‘waste as resource’. It explores the making of circularity by paying detailed attention to what is conceptualized as ‘make-up’ work, i.e. how interruptions and leaks along waste flows are handled in practice. Make-up work capitalizes on its double meaning. First, it highlights the covering of cracks needed in order to transform waste to energy. Second, make-up work pinpoints that the neatness of circularity is far from a straightforward technical system, but is continuously made. Through an interview-based study in Sweden, the article illuminates three steps of transformation of food waste into the commodity of biogas, analysing the material and cultural transformations, showing that the micro-management of preventing such interruptions is crucial. Problems such as lack of or misfit material, difficulties in sorting the substrate effectively, over/underproduction of gas and the political decisions steering the conditions for supply and demand are equally crucial and pose the threat that the production will be viewed as inefficient. Based on these results, the article emphasizes the need to problematize the paradigm of the circular economy and the zero-waste regime, on the one hand, and to recognize the work involved in striving for a sustainable society, on the other.