Industrial symbiosis in Gladstone: a decade of progress and future development

Abstract

Abstract Heavy industrial areas with large volume waste streams show great promise for applying the concept of industrial symbiosis. This article examines industrial symbiosis in Gladstone, one of Australia's rapidly developing heavy industrial areas. Along with the analysis of the area's progress over the last decade and detailed description of existing resource synergies, it also overviews Gladstone's future prospects, including identification of potential resource synergies based on likely future industries and their waste streams, and an estimation of the overall environment benefits from the implementation of these new synergies. Based on estimates of the future waste streams for 2020 there is likely to be a large growth of environmental impacts in the Gladstone industrial area, including a fourfold increase in solid wastes, doubling fresh water consumption and threefold increase in carbon dioxide emissions. The implementation of new synergy projects can significantly contribute to improving resource efficiency covering from 5% to 40% of the overall future emitted and disposed waste streams.