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From Waste To Value: How Australia’s Circular Economy Is Turning Rubbish Into Revenue

by THEFUTURE.TEAM

September 17, 2026

Ten years ago, Lynne Loo was an academic scientist in Australia studying how waste could be repurposed. What began as a research project soon evolved into something larger: a practical blueprint for extracting commercial value from materials most businesses would send to landfill.

Today, Loo is helping startup founders turn that idea into reality. As a waste broker, she connects emerging businesses with markets for by-products and discarded materials, giving viable new ventures a route from laboratory concept to commercial scale.

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Australia’s Waste Problem Creates A Business Opportunity

Australia generates 76 million tonnes of waste each year, according to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water. Much of it still ends up in landfill. That scale of waste presents an environmental challenge, but it also opens a market for entrepreneurs capable of rethinking what discarded materials can become.

Across industries, innovators are finding that waste is not only a disposal problem. In the right hands, it can be a feedstock, a raw material, and in some cases, a high-value product in its own right.

Turning Food Waste Into Cellulose Products

One example comes from Matt Barber, who has built a home laboratory focused on extracting cellulose from food waste. From that material, he is developing paper, leather and wood alternatives, with potential applications in bioplastics as well.

“So, what I get is pure cellulose that comes out and then from there, I process that into other paper, leather or wood products. But it could be turned into a bioplastic. It can be turned into any uses. So you can, instead of growing a tree, which takes 75 years, you can grow this in a week,” Barber explained.

For Barber, the venture fits alongside his day job, but access to the right market is critical. That is where Loo’s work becomes essential. “You have a start up and you don’t know what to do with it and she [Loo] helps you find a market for it,” he said.

From Rubbish To Vinegar, Biochar And Oil

At a waste facility in Collie, Western Australia, Renergi is pursuing a more industrial version of the same principle. Using thermal conversion technology, the company is transforming rubbish into products including vinegar, biochar and oil.

“We can process just under about 30,000 tonnes of biomass waste per year and 4,000 tonnes per annum of the town’s municipal solar waste,” said Deejay Parker of Renergi.

More than 70% of the material is recovered and converted into new outputs. The biochar is already being used on fruit farms and at a winery across Southern Western Australia, demonstrating how waste recovery can create practical value for regional agriculture.

The project has received funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency as part of broader efforts to expand renewable technologies into regional communities. At full scale, it is expected to become one of the country’s largest producers.

Why Circular Thinking Is Winning Traction

Loo says the momentum matters as much as the technology. “I think it’s important for people to see that it’s possible because there are so many naysayers,” she said.

That is the central lesson of Australia’s growing waste innovation sector: with the right science, business model and market access, discarded materials can become industrial inputs, farm products and new revenue streams. In a resource-constrained economy, the smartest waste strategy may be to stop seeing waste as the end of the line.

Instead, it can be the beginning of a new value chain.

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More Than 1.5 Billion People Faced Dangerous Heat This Summer

by THEFUTURE.TEAM

September 18, 2026

More than 1.5 billion people were exposed to dangerous levels of heat this summer, according to a global analysis by nonprofit Climate Central.

The study found that Europe experienced the most unusual heat during June-August 2026, with nearly nine in 10 Europeans exposed to at least one month of what researchers classify as “risky heat.”

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Europe Emerged As The World’s Hottest Region

Climate Central defines risky heat as temperatures above 90% of local temperatures recorded between 1991 and 2020 for the same period. Researchers use the threshold to identify temperatures at which health risks begin to increase.

Across the world, people in 203 countries experienced at least 30 days of risky heat. In 54 countries, June-August 2026 was the hottest such period on record, while seven of the 10 countries with the largest temperature anomalies were in Europe.

France recorded the largest national temperature anomaly, at 3.5C above its historical average.

“Whether it’s nine in 10 Europeans enduring risky heat, hundreds of millions impacted across Asia and Africa, or relentless record-breaking temperatures in North America, human-driven warming is pushing communities beyond safe physical limits,” said Kristina Dahl of Climate Central.

She said the summer’s heat should be viewed in terms of its immediate effects on health systems, labor productivity, infrastructure and household finances.

Simon Stiell, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), who was not involved in the study, said the findings show the rising costs of climate change linked to fossil fuel use.

Clean Energy Faces Rising Demand

Europe’s extreme summer was part of a broader trend that scientists say would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change. Earlier this month, the United Nations said limiting warming to 1.5C is no longer achievable under current conditions.

The latest United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) outlook projects 1.8C of warming in the best-case scenario and more than 2C in less favorable cases. UNEP now describes the likely pathway as “overshoot, peak and decline.”

Renewable energy is central to limiting that overshoot. Renewables generated almost 34% of global electricity in 2025, but UNEP says the share would need to reach 60%-70% by 2030 under a limited-overshoot pathway.

In the European Union, wind and solar generated more electricity than fossil fuels for the first time last year. SolarPower Europe estimates that solar generation has saved the bloc €33.8 billion in avoided gas imports since the start of the war on Iran.

Power Grids Struggle With Growing Demand

Investment in clean energy has reached about $1.9 trillion annually, but renewable generation is meeting only around 40% of the increase in electricity demand. Air conditioning and the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence are contributing to that growth.

According to the International Energy Agency, data center electricity use increased 17% in 2025, reaching roughly 1.5%-2% of global electricity demand. That figure is expected to double by 2030.

Europe’s aging power grids are also struggling to integrate growing amounts of renewable generation, leaving some solar and wind capacity unused. Battery storage can help reduce those bottlenecks, but investment has not kept pace with the scale of the challenge.

This summer’s heat is adding pressure on governments, businesses and infrastructure systems to adapt to higher temperatures while expanding low-carbon energy capacity.