One of the Enel Group's challenges has been quantifying and valuing the business' circularity. For this reason, the Company has developed several instances to know the international and national progress regarding the implementation of metrics that measure circularity.
In September 2021, Enel Chile organized the Webinar "Metrics to Accelerate the Circular Economy in the Company" with SOFOFA HUB and HUB EPD® Latam, where a broad community of experts participated in addressing the state of the art of circularity metrics and complementary methods.
However, there still needs to be a global consensus on how to measure circularity. Various lines of thought and metrics express circularity based on input and output variables, whether material and waste flows, energy generation, consumption, etc. In addition, there needs to be a more significant linkage with sustainability indicators. This aspect is relevant since circularity metrics should also consider the positive/negative externalities they generate on the environmental and social components.
The Enel Group has published its system for measuring the performance of products and processes, called CirculAbility Model©. A methodology developed by the Company based on life cycle analysis and circularity measurement. It incorporates the measurement of material and energy flows resulting from the Company's operations at the level of assets, projects, and services. This model makes it possible to generate a circularity baseline relative to "Business as Usual" and quantify the benefits generated by applying one or more Circular Economy pillars.
It is based on the five pillars of the strategy, and each pillar presents a series of metrics:
Circular inputs: material and energy flows are measured on the input side, depending on whether they are of circular or non-circular origin.
New life cycles: on the output side, material and energy flows are measured according to whether they are recirculated or disposed of as waste.
Sharing platforms: the increase in load factor for sharing a product is measured concerning the standard for that product.
Product as a service: this measures the increase in the load factor for offering a product as a service concerning that product's standard.
Product life extension: the increase in shelf life over the standard shelf life for that product is measured.
