Sustainable Manufacturing Through Creation and Governance of Eco-Industrial Parks

Abstract

With the emergence of the concept of industrial ecology (IE) and the first discovery of its practice in an existent park in Kalundborg, the interest from the scientific community as well as from the public and private stakeholders has increased significantly. For more than a decade, a handful of national programs and private initiatives have been initiated worldwide to implement industrial ecology into existent or newly built industrial parks. To date, more than hundreds of eco-industrial parks (EIPs) have been established. However, the relationship between the context and the origin of EIP initiatives with its methodology of development and management is still not clearly defined. Therefore, the aim of this article is to contribute to filling this knowledge gap. The return of experiences of 19 EIPs worldwide, based on bibliographical and empirical research through literature review and field interviews, allows the definition of a trend in the creation and the management of EIPs according to the context of implementation. This investigation exposes the exclusive relationships between trigger factors to develop an EIP either economic, environmental, or a mix according to the bottom-up, top-down, or mixed approach of creation, respectively. Moreover, it highlights the association dependence between the natures of the approach with the coordination structure and consequently the influence of the social context and the presence of a certain gap of cohabitation of the two extreme systems, i.e., public and private.