Abstract
One of the aspects of industrial ecology is developing a collaborative model of interactions among the companies collocated in a specific area for improving their resource efficiency and environmental impacts as an alternative for the classical competitive models. Being inspired by the natural metaphor, industrial symbiosis (IS) involves connections among traditionally separated processes for shared benefits, for example, networks for exchanging unused resources, waste management infrastructures, etc. Various approaches have been followed for promoting this concept since the late 1990s in different regions. The significance of geographical proximity has resulted in a new perception about the aggregation of activities in eco-industrial parks as the leading operational carrier in these initiatives. Innovative solutions, mostly based on virtualization, were also applied for scaling up symbiosis. This chapter presents an overview of the evolution of the concept of IS, its different scales, tools for its implementation, and some case studies with improved environmental impacts.
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