Decades ago, for no apparent reason at the time, I wrote down, “study ecosystems”. Ever since, I have analyzed damn near everything as an ecosystem, whether it is a physical product manufacturing process, production procedures in IT services development, or an organizational structure to accomplish tasks.

Ecosystems in the natural world, by their mere existence, are naturally structured around efficiency and balance. This type of design and engineering practice is regenerative circularity.

It’s learning from and working with nature to utilize resources most efficiently. It is why there is no garbage in a pristine ancient forest. And why Factories as Forests and Cities as Forests are models planned, developed, and utilized today.

With present-day scientific data collection and management, we can more profitably pivot from linear make-and-throw-away economies to circular economies, where everything we produce is reusable or biodegradable. So any waste we produce is an input for another process while being deliberately regenerative.

When we design and engineer with the end goal of being regenerative, reusable, and biodegradable, we have entirely different designs, engineering, and economics than we do in a linear, planned obsolescence, disposable economy that was considered a good idea after WWII, when the United States had a large surplus of manufacturing facilities. And it was not widely known or realized that we live on a planet with finite resources.

The Living Planet Report shows that since 1970, the average size or abundance of monitored global wildlife populations dropped by 73%. So today, we want to quickly move beyond simply being sustainable and “less bad” to instead being regenerative. This is to counterbalance the loss of ecosystems that help reduce the increased amounts of carbon and other greenhouse gases humans have produced.

We want to envision and think, using the biomimicry life’s principles lens to imitate nature as a design inspiration and engineering element to ensure the protection of our biosphere and a thriving existence as a species.

Otherwise, we will continue to be like a cancer that Earth’s endocrine system will purge, since our planet is the ultimate ecosystem structured around efficiency and balance.

It’s a great time to be alive. Especially with all the green technologies to deploy that get us monkey people back to living in balance and harmony with nature. Because for all too long, the human race as a species has been very wasteful, inefficient, and out of balance.

I will be writing more about regenerative circularity design and how it will change the very nature of our existence, and perhaps even be punny, if not funny, along the way.

Until then, this Learning Lab: The Circular Economy In Detail resource explains a systemic approach to economic development, designed to benefit businesses, society, and the environment.