“We do not want to go to a one, uniform world, but we must move to a sustainable, diversified world.”

Prof. Diels Ludo, Professor Emeritus at the University of Antwerp, and Senior Advisor, VITO, joined a conversation with Honorary POP Ocean Mentor, Ana Hanhausen and other POP youth leaders focusing on the bio-economy and the circular economy, as part of “POP Climate Leadership Conversations: A Tribute to Chief Mentor” on June 10, 2021.

The conversation began with Prof. Ludo sharing his perspective on leadership in the field of bio-economy and circular economy. He believes that it is extremely important to inspire and facilitate people around us to move toward the vision of a sustainable world. To him, leadership is creating a breakthrough and showing what is possible; how a new, sustainable world can look like.

Access to water: A right

Vanshika, a POP youth leader, drew attention to the fact that we were all becoming stressed due to climate change, and that water was running out in countries across the globe. She enquired how we could effectively communicate the importance of reducing this stress. She added to her question by asking how citizens of countries that were likely to run out of water could pressure their governments into taking action. Prof. Ludo responded to her questions by reminding us that fresh water sources were not endless, and that we had contaminated our water sources and depleted our groundwater reserves. He shared his opinion that water usage had to be made more circular. “We have the right to have access to water, but we must use it in a sustainable way,” he said. He also spoke in detail about the concept of taking energy out of water and finding use for the components of wastewater. He further acknowledged that while legislation was important, it was imperative that we take action without waiting for legislation.

Bioeconomy, bio-based economy, and biomass

Samuel, POP Youth Mentor and Ambassador for Africa, asked about the bio-based economy, and to what extent we could integrate biomaterials in our day to day lives. To this, Prof. Ludo first explained the difference between bioeconomy and bio-based economy. “The bioeconomy is the overall use of biomass in whatever way you can imagine,” he said. “The bio-based economy is the use of biomass in other applications than for food,” he added. He further elaborated the need to use biomass to create a carbon sink to take carbon out of the atmosphere. Smart usage of carbon from the atmosphere could lead to the ability to avoid a lot of toxic elements that are present in materials such as fossil-based plastics and these materials could be made less toxic, and more appropriate for our health. He also spoke about the need to develop better and milder biomass disruption methods and warned that we must avoid creating any waste if we use biomass.

The implementation of bio-economy and circular economy

Gloria Thomas from Seas of Change raised a question about how a combination of bio-economy and circular economy could help us to reduce stress on our planet. She further asked how these economies could be implemented. Prof. Ludo answered this question by speaking about his disagreement with the idea of ‘de-carbonization’; “We use, and we need, carbon in our daily lives. Everything is carbon,” he noted. He elaborated the many different uses of carbon and observed that the problem lay with making use of fossil-based carbon. He further spoke about the circular carbon initiative which advocates the use of carbon from the atmosphere, technosphere, and biosphere; but not from the geosphere. He then spoke of circularity, and stressed the importance of moving our carbon usage into a circular system, away from the linear system. He also spoke of the kinds of waste generated by carbon materials and of ways to manage such waste. “For materials that we want to use for a short period of time, it makes sense that they are biodegradable. For materials that we use for a longer period of time, we must make them bio-recyclable,” he said.

The need of big actions for change

For the final question, Meda Hope, a POP youth leader, asked what it was that Prof. Ludo hoped to see as the outcomes of the COP this year. “The Paris Agreement is not enough,” he stated, and explained that it was not enough to make pledges and  that we needed to see plans of action including in the form of investment.

Involvement of citizens

Prof. Ludo concluded the conversation by speaking about the importance of involving citizens in the process of change. “We as citizens must react and ask for better, or climate neutral products,” he said.

ABOUT THE GUEST

Prof. Ludo Diels, Dr. in chemistry & biotechnology, is active as professor emeritus at the University of Antwerp. He teaches environmental stress, water treatment and coping with global change.

He is the chairman of the Industrial Research and Innovation Agenda Group of the Public – Private – Partnership SPIRE (Sustainable Process Industry by Resource and Energy Efficiency) bringing together 10 large industrial sectors (chemistry, steel, cement, minerals, non-ferrous, engineering, ceramics, water, refining, pulp & paper) and chairs these sectors towards climate neutrality, circularity and competitiveness via the Processes4Planet Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda.

He is strongly involved in the set up of a biobased economy in Flanders and Europe, and in the collaboration between Europe and India on bio-economy and water business. He is a founding father and now chairman of the advisory board of the Shared Research Centre on Bio-aromatics (BIORIZON). He is also a founding father of the BioInnovation for Growth Cluster of the trilateral alliance between Flanders, the Netherlands and North Rhine-Westphalia, and the Vanguard Initiative on Interregional Smart Specialisation for bio-aromatics.

He is also working on the combination of bio-economy and circular economy with a strong emphasis on the use of wood and wood residues (strong focus on lignin) for integrated applications in many sectors with a primary focus on construction materials.

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