Decarbonisation and Circular Economy

This article uses scenarios to explore the extent to which decarbonisation strategies combined with different ambitious strategies for reducing and slowing down resource use, can achieve the goals of the Austrian circular economy strategy. Taking into account two different rebound effects, a goods-oriented and a service-oriented use of the freed-up financial resources, the possible economic impacts of different scenarios are examined. The analysis focuses on the building, transport, and electricity generation sectors. It is shown that only the strong circular economy scenario is compatible with the resource conservation targets. If this scenario is combined with a service-oriented rebound effect, assuming a constant savings rate, it also tends to result in the highest average GDP growth rates.