Material governance and circularity policies: How waste policies and innovation affect household appliances' accumulation

Abstract

This paper investigates the macro-economic drivers of accumulation and recycling of material capital from in-use Stock of a class of durable goods: Electrical and Electronic Equipment. This category is relevant for the European policy's objectives for its content of critical raw materials and its relevance in the Digital Agenda. A theoretical model and empirical estimations over a EU27 + UK national panel are developed to understand the optimal dynamic of accumulation, innovation, and recycling. The former is growth models supporting a theory of stock accumulation and stock diversity. This framework is used to delineate possible biases of the empirical analysis, which is made throughout a panel data model estimation. The panel uses weight per capita and Shannon concentration index as target variables to address the Environmental Kuznets Curve. Dummies proxied the Waste Packages of 2008 and 2012 to control for breaks. The results show the high significance of the panel data model within each Stratum of EU states. Waste policies are strongly correlated to increasing EEE material accumulation rather than a reduction ceteris paribus. Socio-economic variables are generally significant, with evidence of economic activity decoupling EEE stock. Lastly, the increase in average durability is positively correlated to material accumulation.