Official kick-off
On Tuesday, April 12, the five leading manufacturers and five national wholesalers kicked off the circular supply chain initiative Circopomp. With this initiative, the industry leaders are taking their circular responsibility by collecting old circulators in a practical way and collectively giving them a second life so that no valuable materials are wasted. In addition, the initiative provides for anchoring social employment and human development.
Chain-wide relief
Every year, 830,000 new circulators enter the Dutch market that provide cold and hot water circulation within buildings and homes, but because of this, 1,900,000 kilograms of old pumps also end up in landfills every year. Circopomp provides for the collection and sorting of the old pumps that are then used directly by the manufacturers as parts or raw materials for the production of new pumps (remanufacture), or the pumps are completely overhauled and re-offered (refurbishment).
“All 10 initiators have green DNA but lacked a chain-wide approach and direction for pumps” said Marco Pastoor of Circospin, the chain director and initiator of the Circopomp initiative. “Only collectively do you achieve real impact and can you offer a practical solution to installation companies so that they are truly circularly unburdened.”
Co-initiator Franjo Stakovic: “Crucial for continuity is also the transparency in achieved results and we provide affiliated partners with an online reporting of all operations in the form of number of pumps collected, CO2 reduction adv a product passport, hours of social employment, saving of virgin material usage etc., among others.”
SROI (social return on investment).
Within the chain, Rotterdam Inclus plays an important role in anchoring the SROI as a social labor and human development company. This will not only house the collection and sorting operations, but will also train employees to refurbish the pumps. With the lack of technical personnel within the chain, mediation will also be provided, where possible, for skilled personnel to join the regular labor market.
The chain initiative is supported by the five leading manufacturers (Biral, DAB, Grundfos, KSB and Wilo) and the five national wholesalers (Plieger, Rensa, Solar, Technische Unie and Wasco), together accounting for more than 95% of all circulators supplied in the Netherlands. But also the national market leaders in the field of technical services such as EQUANS and Unica have already joined, value the chain becomes more and more complete.
The collective cooperation has already established more than 150 collection points nationwide where old pumps can be handed in and where there is also the possibility of returning old pumps upon delivery of new products in consultation with the wholesaler.
If an installation company has a large volume of old circulators from e.g. repair or renovation orders, there is also the possibility for its own Circopump collection pallet in the workshop, warehouse or on work site.
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