3.2.1. Renewable Energy Sources and Public Policies
Energy, an essential asset to human existence, is a point of interest and concern on the world agenda, because the energy sources in use across the globe still assume non-renewable predominance, a factor that signals a lack of research and planning in terms of the quality, energy efficiency, and technology associated with renewable energy sources.
The environmental concern was the starting point for the occurrence of a growing number of studies, mainly in developed countries, which started in 2005 with the Kyoto Treaty, according to which the developed countries assumed commitments to achieve the goals of reducing the emission of pollutant gases, especially carbon dioxide (CO2).
The concern with respect to energy issues, especially the security of supply, and the consequent economic and regulatory repercussions, integrated important studies in order to adapt the guidelines of the world agenda. The European Community began the discussion on the matter within the scope of environmental policy, with a thematic and sectoral focus via directives, which gave rise to the first Action Programs of the European Communities on Environmental Matters.
Among the measures taken to achieve these goals, Gawel et al. [
52] points out the increase in energy efficiency, as well as the promotion of the research, development, and increased use of new, renewable forms of energy. The Paris Agreement, which is premised on strengthening global mechanisms to address the threat of climate change and boosting the ability of countries to combat the impacts arising from these changes, established Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), wherein countries have committed to reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by up to 45% below 2005 levels by 2025. The diversification of the energy matrix is a crucial aspect to address in order to guarantee quality and reliability in energy, which is a strategic characteristic of an efficient energy sector. On the other hand, the diversification of a country’s energy matrix based on non-renewable sources generates high risks to the sustainability of the planet, which is a relevant point with respect to transforming an undeveloped country into a developed one.
For the development of solutions for rapid adaptation, in their review, Dalmazzo-Bermejo et al. [
44] highlight the importance of public policies in promoting renewable sources in order to overcome barriers that may vary depending on the weakness found in each country in terms of the (a) regulatory; (b) economic; (c) technological; or (d) technical scope. Despite the lack of review articles in the sample that list countries and their respective public policies for renewable energies,
Table 5 presents a systematic classification of the articles by their renewable energy sources with their respective countries and authors, which assess the countries capable of dedicating themselves to the study of renewable energies and the CE for public policy decision making in the energy sector. The sources highlighted in the studies were identified through the reading of the articles. The classification of the source “Renewable energies” is related to the strict sense of the word, without any identification of a specific source in the study, but rather the importance of renewable energies and their different forms of generation.
Biomass studies are common in developing countries, which often seek the use of viable sources in rural areas for energy production. Brazil presented studies on forest biomass and biogas, as well as renewable energy, which demonstrates its commitment to expanding renewable energies and places it among the three most attractive emerging markets for investments in the renewable energy sector [
94], whether via a renewable source of energy or material reuse with circularity concepts.
The use of biomass was basically reduced to agricultural regions. However, with the increase in environmental discussions, most countries, to a greater or lesser extent, have been making efforts to use sufficiently mature technologies, and the biomass that is used in processes with high efficiency stands out for having the flexibility to supply both the production of electricity and mobility in the transport sector [
95] when an area is observed that lacks governmental incentives for expansion.
Therefore, Silva et al. [
90] present a policy for forest biomass based on an industrial agreement that favors the application of a circular economic model, thus reducing the use of virgin resources and encouraging the generation of waste in the forest sector, which has the advantage of enabling the high exploitation of materials, providing clean and renewable energy, and reducing the need for landfills. Ribeiro et al. [
86] discuss biogas with the generation of less-pollutant energy from the use of poultry manure for the benefit of society and the public sector, which has the capacity to generate up to 1277 TWh/year, thus scientifically proving the capacity of the circular model to be a propellant of transformation and reuse for electricity generation.
Most of the studies on renewable energies from the perspective of the circular economy are concentrated in the European Union, which represents a range of developed countries that seek efficient and economically viable strategies to achieve the goals established in the Paris Agreement based on the cultural adequacy that sustainability can provide for society. To this end, the reduction in the input of virgin materials and the control of the output of waste are essential to achieve a pragmatic cycle in energy generation and complement the supply of electricity. According to Haas et al. [
12], all material generated by society worldwide (approximately 62 Gt/year) has a flow for disposal (41 Gt/year processed). In the European Union (EU-27), materials are traced from extraction to disposal, but they also maintain a low degree of circularity for two reasons: 1) 44% of processed materials are used to provide energy and, therefore, are not available for recycling and 2) socio-economic actions are still growing at a high rate.
Germany was the country that presented the most incisive studies regarding policies for renewable energies, whether in the evaluation or prospection of public policies, in both economic and social contexts, which marks it as the country with the third highest level of renewable electricity generation. Due to its status as a developed country and a pioneer in technological development in constant innovation, Germany focuses its research on the theme of circularity to strengthen its regulatory policies, with respect to the following main aspects: (1) the assessment of the impacts of energy measures and policies implemented and investments in electricity generation capacity by institutional investors [
76]; (2) the analysis of the public acceptance of energy infrastructure [
65]; (3) increasing the overall efficiency and effectiveness of climate and energy policies, process improvements, and the CE [
52]; (4) increasing the capacity for innovation and partnerships with research associations [
59]; (5) process improvement—the development of products with half the renewable energy of their counterparts in order to achieve zero CO2 emissions and achieve net zero emissions from the circular model [
72,
93]; and (6) increasing public awareness regarding renewable energy technology/circular economy and compensating for the negative consequences of the transition process, thereby raising awareness among the public for their own participation in the emission of greenhouse gases [
71,
91].
Public policies are of fundamental importance in the expansion of renewable energies and the purposes set forth in the global climate agenda, as they are instruments that improve social well-being and economic development. The analysis of public policies has as its object the political decisions and action programs of governments, identifying the origin of the problems that policies need to solve and the conditions for their implementation.
3.2.2. Analysis of Public Policies Concerning Renewable Energies
In order to assess the contribution of the collected studies to the formulation or evaluation of public policies on renewable energies, our systematic analysis of the studies used the classification of the Public Policy Cycle, which constitutes the chaining of phases or stages of the political cycle for the formulation of public policies, seeking to rationalize the alleged actions.
Table 6 presents the classification of articles regarding the benefits associated with the stages of the public policy cycle, that is, prior analysis, prospection or implementation, and evaluation, thereby allowing for the visualization of the trends and the actions of governments and stakeholders involved according to the benefits identified in the publications.
The Prior Analysis stage takes place before any decision is made, within the field of action, and seeks the collective interest, providing broad effects for society [
96]. It is the first phase in the public policy cycle and was verified in 14 publications. In these studies, it considered that the potential expansion of renewable energy combined with the implementation of circular economic practices through public policies may promote the following benefits: (1) enable the analysis of the opportunities and risks to employment, skills, and education that are related to a CE in the United States, as well as provide a base for future research on public policies for the development of renewable energy projects; (2) support the development of renewable energy in Romania; (3) contribute to the literature on strategy/managers achieving a higher degree of circularity; (4) decrease the consumption of fossil fuels by facilitating the effective employment of a simple system for biogas production and a two-stage drying system; (5) involve students in public policy and its dimensions, create processes, and encourage environmental sustainability; (6) increase the production of secondary raw materials and the recovery of new waste streams that occur in material recycling; (7) aid the measurement and assessment of the degree of circularity of a company; (8) improve material efficiency; (9) reduce environmental impacts and resource scarcity, promote product circularity, and improve material efficiency; (10) mitigate possible regional excesses, and replace conventional high-impact products with bio-resources, thereby reinforcing sustainability within a CE; (11) predict the response of different locations towards the use of renewable sources and a CE; (12) greatly reduce CO
2 emissions and improve their capture and storage processes; (13) regarding technology and Innovation, promote the CE among industries, enhance the mitigation of additional greenhouse gases, and support process improvement in the evaluation and consideration of the design of sustainable circular products and systems; and (14) increase the availability of renewable energies given the growth in population demand.
Lausselet et al. [
47] classified their study as a prior analysis due to the questions asked in the study objectives, from which the research results can unfold into policies to be implemented. Given these factors, the authors analyzed Norway’s potential energy waste generated in a decade. Accordingly, the following question was asked: what threats and opportunities are anticipated? In an attempt to answer this question, the study combines an analysis based on four situations: (1) the current situation of the Norwegian sector; (2) the implications of the CE; (3) the addition of circularity to the current system; and (4) a landfill waste disposal scenario. Climate change is considered a major global challenge, and the decarbonization of the energy sector requires transformation and involves an increase in renewable actions and the incorporation of carbon capture and storage processes.
The mapping of the ‘public problem’ in the previous analysis established the structure of the problem from its origin, and the possibilities of different solutions were presented. If diverging from a technical, scientific study, the solutions may only consider momentary political ideologies and the interests at stake of the groups involved. Thus, decisions will be made based on the solutions presented that have greater technical certainty for future implementation, which characterizes the second stage of the public policy cycle [
97].
The second stage, called prospection, presented 25 publications that analyzed the structure of the problem and provided the alternatives to be implemented. The main benefits, according to the authors, were cataloged and divided into two thematic groups: Efficiency Policies and Innovation Policies.
In the studies that addressed renewable energy Efficiency Policies and the CE, the following benefits that promote cost reduction, energy efficiency, and the expansion of renewables were recorded: (1) facilitating the analysis of the efficiency and effectiveness of a combination of policies, increasing the global efficiency of climate and energy policies, and increasing public awareness of renewable energy technology/the CE; (2) decreasing resource consumption, stimulating the adoption of CE, supporting sustainable development, and providing guidance at different stages of the industry cycle for the transition to the CE; (3) improving the analysis, planning, and implementation of policies for the CE in the European Union, as well as improving processes and products to achieve net zero CO2 emissions; (4) optimizing the CE system and industry growth; (5) enabling wind energy development policies in the United States; (6) supporting the commercial viability of renewable energy policies, the integration of waste management policies, and sustainable development; (7) promoting CE practices, resource recovery, and waste management, practices, and policies with a lasting impact on resource recovery; and (8) reducing the cost of electricity, supporting the investment in education, and creating awareness of the benefits of renewable energy.
The group composed of innovation policies for renewable energy and the CE in the prospection stage presented benefits towards the promotion of research and use of technology, such as: (1) alternative, economic, renewable, and green sources of energy such as hydrogen, employing commercially viable hydrogen production through viable sources in the rural area of the state; (2) cleaner energy generation through the use of manure to generate energy, which would enable the generation of 1277 TWh/year, constituting a path that the biomethane industry could materialize; (3) innovation in the production and use process, as well as the development of a PV module for easier recycling or reuse-focused integration of different systems; (4) promoting the minimization of waste, the re-planning of energy use, the redesigning of products and services, and the approval of interdependent CE activities; (5) providing high material exploitation, reducing the need to extract virgin resources, providing clean and renewable energy, and reducing the need for landfills; (6) reducing the harmful effects of fossil fuels on the climate and reducing resource intensity to mitigate climate change; (7) facilitating the use of biological treatment for energy production, biorefinery, and process improvement, and reducing dependence on fossil fuels; (8) reducing the exploitation of non-renewable energy resources and GHG emissions; and (9) supporting waste management and the sustainable use of agricultural plastic.
After these two stages are over, the manager/researcher will be able to evaluate the results of the public policy, observing its impacts and whether it was possible to achieve the expected results. If deemed unsatisfactory or negative, readjustment or replacement by other actions or public policies may be promoted.
For the evaluation phase, 26 publications were identified, incorporating the following discussions: (1) the manufacture of a design and framework for encouraging public opinion to strengthen the measures taken towards integrate public policies concerning renewable energies; (2) analysis of public acceptance of the energy infrastructure; (3) raising awareness of CE issues; (4) compensation for the negative consequences of the transition process, enacting confidence measures, and raising the public’s level of awareness of their own participation in the emission of greenhouse gases; (5) the determination of what has been hampering the implementation of renewable energies in Japan; (6) the way in which to achieve considerable CO2 reductions, job growth, product exports, green growth, and important economic effects; (7) how to allow companies to increase their capacity for innovation, the formation of partnerships with research associations, and innovative product portfolios; (8) the export of raw materials and employment of the population in the CE; (9) the generation of greater public support and participation; (10) policy implementation implications based on studies, the development of policy instruments to allow diffusion in the short market, and the maintenance of investment in renewable energies in the long term; (11) acceptance mapping for the construction of new renewable energy plants; (12) policies for more positive attitudes and fewer protest intentions; (13) the improvement of the growth of social stock due to the generation of renewable energies; (14) the improvement of the security of the domestic energy supply and waste recovery. (15) reducing greenhouse gases and improving institutional investment conditions, advisable policy instruments, and economic and fiscal incentives; (16) the improvement of knowledge regarding financial resource management, the minimization of environmental degradation, the encouragement and use of renewable energies, the monitoring of energy and environmental efficiency for OECD cooperation, climate change as an object of international policy, and the development of NCR projects; (17) the use of alternatives to prioritize renewable energy sources (petrochemical industry and the production of renewable fertilizers; the use of abundant biomass to give priority to other renewable energy sources; and agriculture returning to an economy based on stakeholder cooperation between value chains; and (18) the programming of the global bio economy to achieve the main premise of the CE.
West et al. [
20] presented an assessment of renewable energy expansion policy by identifying public dissatisfaction with the location of facilities and public reluctance to invest in renewable energy, making this factor one of the main obstacles to the expansion of the renewable energy sector in the UK and other European countries. However, the research was undertaken to explore ways in which government policies for renewable energy can be adapted to generate greater public support and participation. The issues discussed include the granting of economic incentives and societal awareness of climate change that links renewable energy to global energy behavior and the preservation of the environment.
3.2.4. CE and Renewable Energy
Products and services are adapting their purposes, seeking not to exhaust their material, with great interest in the renewal of a product’s life cycle. The traditional model of production and services was based on the linear logic or “take-make-dispose”, which is, in turn, based on the modification of products from the extraction of raw materials from an exhaustible source and that do not have a correct form of treatment for the waste generated. The pollution generated from population growth will require more products, more food, more water, and more energy, which, in turn, will require concrete measures in order to mitigate this scenario [
98].
In developing and emerging countries, renewable energies are considered essential elements for economic evolution and growth, as well as for equality, social well-being, and economic insertion. Governments and companies around the world adopt the CE concept as an intelligent management tool, as it reveals challenges with respect to end-of-life and product quality [
99]. Murray et al. [
100] describes the CE as “an eco-economic model in which resources, procurement, production and reprocessing are designed to consider environmental performance and human well-being”. The CE arose from the need for an alternative model with which to achieve sustainability that seeks to maintain the flow of materials and products in their greatest utility and value through the re-design of products and the development of new business models [
101]. In a holistic approach, the CE transforms waste into new resources, supports the use of renewable energy, and promotes the elimination or minimization of toxic components [
102]. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation [
103] stated that the CE became more visible in the 1990s, and was propagated in several schools of thought, such as Regenerative Design [
104], Industrial Ecology [
105], and Performance Economics [
106].
Geissdoerfer et al. [
107] define CE as “a regenerative system in which the input of resources and the emission of waste and energy leakage is minimized by decelerating, closing and narrowing energy circuits”. The CE regulates practical strategies and plans at different levels [
108,
109] to achieve the more efficient use of energy, water, and material natural resources, on the one hand, while restricting the disposal of waste into the environment on the other hand [
110]. The CE’s value relates to the scarcity of resources and the taxes levied on them. Therefore, the CE can reflect social and environmental externalities. From the perspective of the CE, materials and resources can be recovered and reused in a seemingly endless process that guarantees the realization of economic value [
99].
In the energy sector, initiatives range from the development of cleaner sources of energy from organic waste and new business models to energy management. Therefore, a classification procedure was performed considering the EC perspectives and relating the premises identified in the articles of the systematic review. Thus, the interfaces were identified among the conceptual characteristics described in the literature for each of the analyzed terms, based on reverse logistics practices, closed loop, double loop, upcycle, industrial symbiosis, life-cycle analysis, cradle to cradle, and the CE.
Table 7 presents the correlations made between the perspectives of the CE and its premises, associating the studies with the authors identified from the benefits made possible in the articles that make up the review.
Complementary perspectives are understood to be those that have interfaces with each other, are often applied concomitantly in industrial activities, and produce effective results for the sustainability of the planet. The complexity of the practices necessary for the effectiveness of a CE is applied throughout the production chain, in such a way as to enable investments and the formulation of innovation policies that make sustainable development possible. The existing overlap between such perspectives contributes to creating a systemic conjuncture of a production chain, in which gains can be shared between all links, generating results for companies and society either autonomously or through incentives.
In addition to clarifying the conceptual aspects related to the technical terms of the CE, which are used in the high-level academic and business environments, it is necessary to disseminate ideas of reuse that should mainly reach areas of society that are burdened with the effects of the greater generation and accumulation of waste. Thus, the framework built illustrates the existing interfaces and suggests topics for future studies that could be developed to research, identify, and analyze the various methodologies and tools that can be used to operationalize the described perspectives, as well as trigger organizations to commit to the sustainability guidelines promulgated by the UN (redistributive and distributive public policies) and help those countries that adopt sustainable guidelines in a reactive way under the aegis of punishment (regulatory public policies).
This systematic review correlating CE perspectives and their respective assumptions can allow managers and consultants to disseminate the contributions from the literature to companies in order to implement decision making related to adopting the best techniques and practices in the production chain so as to promote sustainability [
111]. The framework applied herein enabled the mapping of the authors and their respective countries for each of the discussed practices, thereby enabling future studies concerning the impacts on operational efficiency within the organizations that adopt said practices. Public managers can use the different typologies presented herein to propose public policies towards renewable energies that contribute to the progress of sustainability in organizations and to the expansion of the circularity of resources in the transition processes of the electricity matrix. Energy production is a critical issue in the CE. Thus, the recovery stage of the 4Rs approach—reduction, reuse, recycling, and recovery—is related to energy recovery through waste recycling.