Metabolic is an ecosystem of organizations striving for systems change. Our mission is to transition the global economy to a fundamentally sustainable state – a broad and urgent goal that no entity can achieve alone. Together with a growing network of partners, we are working to equip organizations all over the world with tools and insights to catalyze this change.
See how we did in 2020
"COVID has the potential to ignite a revolution in the way that we relate to one another and the biological world. We need to take the time – especially now – to look at our world anew using the lens of systems thinking. Only by understanding the deep interconnections between institutions, people, and the environment will we be able to craft pathways toward a genuinely sustainable and resilient economy; one that works for all people and supports the flourishing of all living beings." — To truly ‘build back better,’ a systems approach is key
Eva Gladek, Founder and CEO, Metabolic
2020 at a glance
Completed 81 Consulting projects
Worked on 9 ongoing Institute projects
37,065 Publication views
Our work reached cities across the globe in 2020.
six transitions
To accelerate global systems change, Metabolic focuses on six key transitions:
Cities and regions
Food and land use
Products and services
Finance
Governance
Mindset
In this report, we will look at the three transitions where we made the most tangible impact over the past year.
in this report
About Metabolic
Metabolic supports governments, businesses, academia, and NGOs in adapting to a fast-changing global context, while creating disruptive solutions that can dramatically shift how the economy functions. In all of our work – research, strategic advice, the development of tools, and the building of new ventures – we use systems thinking to understand how different sustainability challenges are interlinked, and to identify their true root causes. Working in this way helps us understand where it’s most effective to intervene, and where we can have the greatest impact.
our team
23 nationalities
Grew by 34% in 2020
57% male and 43% female
our theory of change
Our theory of change identifies the steps needed to drive the transformation to a more sustainable and circular economy. Our work resulted in impacts at every level in 2020.
Set the direction
We seek to understand the system, develop a vision, and identify leverage points.
54 analyses of current states
43 strategies and vision
Plan and gather resources
We communicate the vision and create urgency, form powerful coalitions, and create intervention strategies and action roadmaps.
31 projects led to aligned coalitions
42 projects included workshops and courses
34 strategic roadmaps with interventions delivered
Act and empower
We take action, empower others to act, build capacity, and measure and monitor progress.
2 Ventures in development process
16 capacity building documents delivered
35 KPIs and monitoring frameworks developed
15 new tools developed
7 master plans delivered
Scale the change
We disseminate knowledge, scale change by building on successes, and change the rules of the system.
32 projects led to new internal processes
19 projects led to the adoption of circular design principles
26 strategies and visions have been adopted
12 tools have been adopted
26 served as a catalyst for other projects
Our ecosystem
Our ecosystem has grown into eight distinct, impact-driven entities that address critical leverage points towards our common goal of global systems transformation. Five entities make up our core operations, with three spinoffs contributing towards our broader ecosystem.
Sustainable scoring system transforming consumption via an e-commerce marketplace.
Cities and regions
We envision a new urban future -- where cities and regions operate within planetary boundaries and provide healthy, inclusive, and happy habitats for people.
"What really attracts me to the built environment is that it's very much a part of society, very much a combination of culture and challenges."
Nico Schouten, Green Building Consultant
Our cities work focuses on four key outcomes:
In-depth insights on sustainability through urban metabolism analysis
Place-based prototyping of regenerative city models
Capacity building that supports cities and regions on regenerative models
Science-based targets for cities that can be implemented at scale
At a glance:
Our work on 36 consulting projects focused on the following areas:
type
projects
City-wide circularity strategies
The built environment and green building
Organizational strategy
Area development
Raw materials and recycling
Here are a few highlighted projects from 2020:
metabolic consulting
Urban mining scans on two continents
Assessing all materials used in the construction sector in the Netherlands and the United States
The construction sector is the biggest consumer of material, so it is ripe with opportunities to improve circularity.
We partnered with SmartCityPHL to pilot an urban mining tool in Philadelphia that predicts the supply of used materials that can be repurposed in new construction. This ultimately shortens supply chains, increases a city’s resiliency, and reduces environmental impacts.
“Metabolic’s analysis has already identified new opportunities for entrepreneurship and innovation in Philadelphia in building design, construction, deconstruction, and material management.”
Designing circular resource flows in European cities
This ongoing EU Horizon 2020 project, by the Institute and supported by the Software team, explores key material flows through urban landscapes. Circular innovations and strategies will be developed based on the flows to strengthen the cities’ regenerative capabilities.
general
3 years, 6 cities
Amsterdam
Berlin
Cluj-Napoca
Milan
Paris
Vejle
our progress
Metabolic Institute first developed a material flow analysis for the cities, assessing critical urban resource flows including plastic, textile, organic waste, timber, and energy. We then developed interventions to reduce negative impacts of the major environmental hotspots.
our ongoing work
The pilot cities are currently exploring how to embed circular practices in key local industries.
metabolic consulting
A sustainability strategy for Amvest
We developed a sustainability vision with measurable indicators and a concrete strategy for Amvest, a Netherlands-based investment manager and residential home developer.
opportunities
Amvest Investment Management manages:
Nearly 20,000 homes for 50,000 tenants
Three portfolios
10,000 homes in the pipeline from Amvest Development
outcomes
Data-driven analysis of the ecological footprint of the portfolio and operational strategies
A sustainability vision with concrete objectives and measurable indicators
Design of a decision-making tool and monitoring dashboard to support the realization of the sustainability vision
metabolic consulting
Monitoring tool for Rotterdam
We continued to work with Rotterdam, which has bold ambitions to become a waste-free city by 2050.
A new monitoring tool and dashboard helped Rotterdam examine how different sectors are performing and where there are opportunities to continue improving circularity.
monitoring
Sectors the tool can monitor:
Waste streams (public, commercial)
Personal consumption (food, cosmetics)
Energy use (household, public, commercial)
In an effort to:
Halve raw material usage by 2030 (from 2018)
our continued relationship with the city
Previously, we helped the city develop:
A 2019-2030 circularity action plan
A systemic food policy focused on a healthy, sustainable, and accessible diet for all
An urban mining hub framework
metabolic consulting
Dutch water boards transition to circularity
We have worked with more than half of the water boards in the Netherlands to kick off their transition to circularity by 2050.
opportunities
Potential to better use wastewater, which is full of valuable resources, including nutrients and thermal energy
Potential for closing resource cycles
outcomes
Baseline assessments for 13 of 21 Dutch water boards, to understand flows and leverage points
Developed a full circular strategy for 7 water boards
metabolic consulting
A circular Denmark
We worked with three of the five regions in Denmark to improve circular systems.
3 new pieces of clothing per year recommended to stay within a carbon budget
3x times more textiles produced since 1975
Spectral's smart energy
Spectral tackles the obstacles in transitioning the global energy sector towards a 100% sustainable energy supply.
Spectral, one of the spin-off companies in our ecosystem, believes that one of the most urgent issues is solving how to provide for our energy needs in a sustainable way. Spectral tackles the obstacles in transitioning the global energy sector towards a 100% sustainable energy supply, with a focus on markets, buildings, transportation, and energy generation and distribution (battery storage and smart grids).
Total direct impact
2,071 tonnes of CO2 emissions saved
The equivalent of:
207 people living in the Netherlands
714 round trip flights to Bogotá, Colombia
778 times the electricity consumption of the Spectral office
Additional indirect impact due to other projects is not quantified here.
Spectral’s projects
248 tonnes of CO2 saved with the Smart Building Platform, which optimizes energy efficiency in 5 office buildings
1,803 tonnes of CO2 saved at Hartel and Hellegatsplein, two battery charging hubs powered by wind farms using our software.
Together with our partners, we are working towards a fully regenerative food system that thrives within the planet’s boundaries, producing healthy food efficiently and accessibly, while supporting flourishing ecosystems.
“Really pushing the boundaries in terms of what transformational change can look like is what’s especially interesting to me, and pressuring people a little bit, because we have such a limited time.”
Louisa Durkin, Sustainability Consultant
Our food and land use work focuses on five key outcomes:
Net-positive biodiversity road mapping
Science-based targets for carbon and nature
Integrated capital assessment: natural, social, human, and produced capital
Circular and regenerative agriculture strategies
Packaging and plastics strategies
At a glance:
In 2020, we worked with pioneering organizations on:
Decarbonization roadmaps
Regional nutrient assessments
Holistic impact assessments
Policy formulation
Sustainable development and strategies
In 2020, we completed 9 projects with NGOs, companies, and governmental organizations to:
An ongoing EU Commission-funded project across Europe exploring citizen-driven and sustainable urban food initiatives for innovative business models.
opportunities
European cities are overwhelmingly net importers of food.
Citizens are increasingly disconnected from their food sources.
outcomes
4-year project in 15 European pilots
Rigorous sustainability assessment framework
Scalable solutions will foster the dissemination of innovative best practices.
Educate and engage current and next generations in their city-region food systems.
our process
Metabolic Institute is developing an open-source aquaponics farm that aims to be an educational center for urban food production. In addition to producing marketable fish and vegetables, the greenhouse will serve as a space for training and dissemination of aquaponics techniques to allow others to design, build, and manage their own small-scale aquaponics units.
urban farming hackathons
50 participants
2 areas: nutrients and accessibility
Teams explored how to advance our aquaponics farm, focusing on closing the nutrient loop via automation of our struvite reactor and developing a conceptual user interface design for our open-source aquaponics management software.
An analysis of the effects of production and consumption of food in the Baltic Sea basin.
Metabolic developed a nutrient flow analysis for the WWF to identify opportunities to close the loop on nitrogen and phosphorus flows.
opportunities
279 kilotons of nutrients flow into the Baltic Sea
Agricultural run-off harms the health of the sea and causes ecological dead zones
our continued relationship with the city
10-18% of nutrients in pigs’ diets in the catchment area could be replaced by food waste.
10-30% of nutrients in imported mineral fertilizers could be replaced by improved manure handling.
Crop residues are an under-utilized source of nitrogen and phosphorus.
partnerships
Partnerships and coalitions help us to expand our reach and heighten our impact. There is no way, even with a huge amount of resources, that our ecosystem alone could tackle the challenges we are facing. A multitude of perspectives and a broad range of expertise and specialization allow us to make real progress. This year, we grew our partnerships, particularly in our work in Agrifood and Biodiversity.
We are part of a network of more than 50 of the world’s forward-looking organizations working to transform economic systems for the benefit of society and to sustain the natural systems of Earth.
We deepened our relationship with the Science Based Targets Network (SBTN), a global initiative to guide companies and cities to set science-based targets for Earth’s systems and to ultimately reduce their impact and dependencies on nature. We also developed standardized practices and target frameworks for the most effective impact reduction.
Brian Shaw
Agrifood and Biodiversity Team Lead
interested in learning more?
Reach out to our Agrifood and Biodiversity Team Lead
Metabolic works with partners towards a world where all products and services are created in a safe operating space where both people and the planet can thrive.
“I want to be part of the integrated system that works across solutions rather than just putting a bandaid over a systemic problem that we're seeing.”
An assessment of the circular potential of beverage containers in the U.S.
Metabolic and the Can Manufacturers Institute explored the potential for a fully circular beverage packaging sector in the United States, focusing on aluminum cans, glass bottles, and plastic bottles.
opportunities
The majority of the 200+ billion disposable beverage containers used annually in the U.S. end up in landfills, resulting in significant economic and environmental losses.
Recycling 100% of aluminum cans could save 6 million metric tons of CO2e each year.
outcomes
Actionable recommendations to increase the circularity of each packaging type, particularly through bottle deposit collection systems and localized reuse systems.
This science-based tool guides businesses towards packaging materials with a lower environmental footprint.
Plastic is a major contributor to many environmental issues. The Alternative Materials Tool, developed for WWF Singapore, measures the environmental impacts of packaging types and offers sustainable alternatives.
opportunities
Expand impacts of WWF’s No Plastic in Nature initiative.
Provide clear guidance for companies on best packaging materials specific to use and context.
our continued relationship with the city
Potential for our Software team to customize the tool for other regions, industries, and products.
The Singapore region views the tool as critical to achieve its zero waste master plan for plastics.
Minimizing the impacts of the IT production system
We evaluated different purchasing criteria for IT equipment for the Dutch department of waterways, Rijkswaterstaat, aiming to reduce environmental impacts across the equipment’s life cycle.
opportunities
Every person in the Netherlands is responsible for an average of 24kg of e-waste, contributing to the 50 million tons produced worldwide annually.
With Rijkswaterstaat’s aim to become fully circular by 2030, we looked at how to minimize the impact of IT through informed purchasing decisions
outcomes
A clear handbook with rules and criteria to make more informed, sustainable decisions.
Greater systemic impact could result if national or international collaboration results.
metabolic consulting
Environmental impact assessment for the Dutch Custodial Agency
A full assessment of the direct and indirect environmental impact of the Dutch Custodial Agency.
Metabolic conducted a materiality assessment for the organization, calculated its carbon footprint and other environmental impacts, and developed a roadmap with interventions to reduce the overall footprint.
opportunities
120,000 tonnes of CO2 linked to the organization
The proposed interventions add up to a reduction of:
90,000 tonnes CO2
2,500 tonnes of resources
2,800 tonnes of waste
outcomes
A comprehensive current state assessment of the organization’s environmental footprint.
A set of feasible recommendations that can reduce the carbon footprint of the organization by 73%.
metabolic foundation
Metabolic Foundation
A participatory action organization based in Aruba, our Foundation shifted much of its focus in response to COVID-19. Recycling temporarily stopped and maker spaces shut down — but the Foundation made progress towards its mission of a more equitable and sustainable world.
by the numbers
600 makers engaged
1,000 projects through Mo-B Lab, a mobile makerspace, that worked with 3 schools and 500 children
8,000 pieces of PPE were made for Aruba’s residents
1,700 kg of plastic recycled through Plastic Beach Party
