BluPlanet Recycling Inc. (BluPlanet), was a successful recycling service provider based in Calgary, Alberta, that faced the challenge of maintaining its balance between social, environmental, and economic objectives amid rapid growth. Its chief executive officer was considering plans regarding the expansion of the company while preserving its social and environmental commitments. The options included diversifying from waste collection and transportation .....more

On October 31, 2017, Terry Hay, patriarch of the Hay family and leader of the family business, was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer and given three weeks to live. This grim prognosis placed the Hay family on an unexpected trajectory and forced them to confront Terry’s health crisis while grappling with the impending transition of their family business, Scandinavian Building Services Ltd. (SBS), based in Edmonton. Although the family had .....more

The case explored whether a novel design for a recycling bin could promote proper recycling behaviours in Singapore. The redesigned recycling bins were initially deployed at different sites around the National University of Singapore to assess their effectiveness among the university community, with promising results. The team now wanted to investigate whether the improved recycling habits observed on campus could be replicated in more diverse public .....more

Student Spreadsheet to accompany product W37339.

Supplemental R code to accompany product W37340.

The recycling system was in desperate need of innovation in North America in 2020. The average person was generating 12 times their body weight in landfilled trash annually, and the equivalent to a dump truck full of plastic waste was entering the world's oceans every minute. This crisis prompted Ainslie Simmonds and Mark Manley to develop MeCycle, an innovative, technology-enabled platform to help change consumer behaviour and increase recycling .....more

In February 2021, the managing director of The Shakti Plastics Industries (Shakti) was facing challenges related to the Indian government’s announcement of a complete ban by 2022 on single-use plastic—a key item that Shakti had been recycling through technological innovations over the previous few decades. The company was eager to support the government’s vision of enabling a circular plastics economy. However, changes in the regulatory landscape .....more

Circulr was a start-up that provided a solution for consumer waste by collecting used packaging, washing it, and selling it back to the original brand and product manufacturer so that the packaging could be reused. Instead of building its own washing facility, Circulr rented spare washing capacity from industrial kitchens. The company’s co-founders had ambitious goals for Circulr, but in order to achieve them, there were two essential issues that .....more

The Happy Turtle was a bootstrapped start-up in Delhi, India, that was focused on driving a circular economy for plastics. The company aimed to offer sustainable and biodegradable lifestyle alternatives to plastic, which could secure a greener future for the planet. The founder of The Happy Turtle had left a successful and flourishing corporate culture to follow her passion for sustainability. By mid-2019, The Happy Turtle had been growing at a slow .....more