So my name is Jos and I’m working on research in circular economy and automotive sector, and I would like to know your point of view. If you accept, I’m going to record our conversation, transcribe it and put the transcription with a pseudonym, not with your real name in a repository of text documents that will be used for the research. If we do this and you change your mind later and no longer want to participate, get in touch with us and we will immediately remove your interview from the repository. I’m leaving you on the information sheet with contact information. If you agree with that, then please tell your name and that you agree.
My name is Milo O’Connor and I agree.
Thank you very much, Milo. So the first question, can you define a circular economy in your own words?
Um, so a circular economy. Um, I studied this a little bit last year on my dissertation. I didn’t really finish it, but, um, yeah, it’s, um, primarily the idea of reuse, reusing as much as possible, um, reducing waste as much as possible and then recycling as much as possible. And yeah, sort of the way you would do that. There’s lots of sort of I haven’t studied it for a while, but I know there’s lots of little, um, little channels of um, how to sort of redistribute waste in a fairer way. So instead of basically the primary thing, what I know about it, instead of I can’t remember the name of the waste economy we’ve got now, but there’s a big problem with lots of waste, um, from, um, the, the top, the richest countries, Um, it’s not being recycled properly. There’s lots of waste. It sort of overflows and then sort of when it gets disposed of, it sort of gets sort of transported to, uh, lots of countries in the global south. Um, and then you get lots of problems. Like it can cause cancer, sort of, uh, skin pollution, air pollution, lots of pollution. So I suppose using a circular economy would sort of reduce the amount of waste that goes to the global South. Uh, and yeah, I don’t know, I could, I could write a whole essay on this, but yeah.
Uh, do you participate in a circular economy yourself in any aspect of your life?
Um, yeah. I mean, obviously I like to reuse water bottles and recycle stuff, like, as much as I can. And if I do try and see a recycling bin, if. Yeah, if I’m doing something just daily or if I’m just relaxing, I do try and do that, I suppose. I don’t know, like a lot of people, a lot of people like including myself, sometimes don’t really stop and like just try to get on with the day and sort of don’t really stop to think about these things as much as possible. It’s not really sort of ingrained in us, really. So that’s sort of a sort of a big problem. Yeah.
Uh, how did you become interested in the circular economy, ideas and practices?
Um, yeah, that’s a difficult question. I mean, um, I suppose. Well, I studied politics at university and I don’t know, I’ve been sort of all my life. I’ve been sort of sort of trying to find this one thing because I’m quite into sports as well, trying this one thing that I can sort of merge all my ideas together. And for a long time I didn’t realize it would be sort of the idea of a circular economy and a cleaner environment. But I actually think it’s a really sort of nice idea and we need to start looking into the future. And I was just searching through Instagram one time and Nico Rosberg was advertising the festival. And so then I started looking at a lot of the practices and that sort of thing, and then I got really interested in doing it for my uni work last year as well. Um, pretty much, yeah.
Milo In your opinion, can a circular economy be implemented in individual sectors or industries? What do you think? Um.
I mean it depends. Um, it really depends. I mean, I suppose a lot of, um. Maybe. Maybe the food industry. Um. Yeah, perhaps. Just off the top of my head. But, um. Yeah, it’s sort of difficult. Um. Yeah. Um. Yeah. Okay.
Do you think the circular economy already exists in the car industry?
Um. Ey. So kind of. That’s a weird answer. But then kind of because you see you do see electric cars, but it’s not like it’s a very small minority who actually have electric cars or can actually afford them or have the time to charge electric cars. Um, yeah, it’s not really sort of it’s not really normalized yet, I suppose.
Um, what do you think what, what role do you think could the circular economy play in the car industry? What is your opinion.
Um, again. Again. Like, I’m not really. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m. Because I was struggling to answer the industry question. But now you’ve asked me that. Um, I suppose it´s really matter sort of what specific industry you can you try and sort of pinpoint where to go with it? It always come back to the problem. They’ll, they’ll just be too much electrical waste. Electrical wastes perhaps. Um, yeah. Going into the global South. Um, and that can be any in any sort of industry. Um, so yeah, um, I’ve actually, if I answer the industry question again, um, if I answer that one, um, I would say sort of electrical waste, um, perhaps that one could have a think about it because. Yeah.
Um, do you currently own a car?
No, I can’t drive. I can’t drive. I can’t drive, but I don’t really need to drive because, well, I live in a city that has a great transport system. Everything’s very walkable. Everything is very accessible. Yeah, it’d just be a waste of a waste of. Yeah. Money and. Yeah. Emissions.
But you have information or, you know, what is the car electronics or electronics in the cars?
Um, I have a vague idea.
Um, when you think about car electronics, what is coming at first in your mind? Um.
What’s coming first? Um. I don’t know. They. They ride quite smoothly. They ride very quietly. Um, and then if I think about it more, um, yeah, just sort of. Yeah. Charging it and stuff. Um, I mean, yeah, it’s not really my area of expertise, but, um, I suppose. Yeah, it´s matter what industry. Um, yeah, it would help sort of reduce the electrical waste. Um, yeah. Distribute it so.