Save the Date: Circular Economy Expert Talks 2026

Rethinking Value: Standards for a circular resource economy

On 17 November 2026 Austrian Standards, in collaboration with the Circular Economy Forum Austria, is delighted to invite you to Expert Talks: Circular Economy 2026 … in order to jointly examine the role that standardisation plays in a resilient, resource-efficient and competitive circular economy, and how it can support the preservation of material value throughout the entire life cycle.

Nowadays, material and product value is often lost at the interfaces of the value chain – for example, due to missing information, inconsistent quality requirements, different legal classifications or a lack of confidence in secondary raw materials. Standards establish common quality requirements, data structures and assessment criteria, and make it possible to preserve material values throughout the entire life cycle and utilise them economically.

The event „Rethinking Value“ therefore does not focus on recycling as an isolated solution, but rather considers the circular economy as a systemic transformation across the entire life cycle.

Among other things, the focus is on the expanded Producer responsibility (EPR), quality standards for recycled and secondary materials, classification and traceability of material flows – for example, through the Digital Product Passport – digital systems for tracking materials and resources, including interfaces with BIM, as well as urban mining as a strategic contribution to security of supply.

The main question of the event is: How can standardisation help to turn today’s waste into a valuable resource for a circular economy – and what conditions are needed for a sustainable industrial system?

This raises the following questions for discussion:

• What role do data, transparency and traceability play in ensuring that product and material cycles function effectively?
• How can quality, trust and comparability be ensured in circular material flows?
• How can standardisation help to roll out circular business models and resource strategies across the industrial sector?

The aim of the event is to highlight the biggest barriers to a functioning circular economy, to identify standardisation needs and to demonstrate, how the circular economy can be implemented in practice as part of a resilient and competitive industrial strategy.