Q2 Network Meeting 2025 at the Rediscovery Centre, Ballymun

A day of circular innovation at the Q2 CIRULÉIRE member network meeting on Wednesday 11th June hosted at The Rediscovery Centre in Ballymun. 

Kicking off with a tour of the centre (and former district heating boiler house), members witnessed the circular opportunities in our everyday lives, from bike repairs to upcycled lamps and paint to reupholstered and revamped furniture. The centre showcases citizen circularity in action and was a fitting venue to inspire our group to forge ahead with CIRULÉIRE‘s innovation sprints. 

Delivered by IMR’s Circular Economy Policy & Innovation Lead Sophie Reynolds in partnership with Laura McDermot from Colectivo, the day was designed to embed the RD&I and collaboration opportunities posed by addressing circularity challenges.   

Dr. Geraldine Brennan IMR Director of Circular Economy & Innovation welcomed the group and Fiona Hill, CE Strategic Policy Unit, DCEE gave an update on the Public Consultation for a ‘National Policy Statement & Roadmap on Circular Textiles’ that is open until the 7th of July.  Fiona noted that the second ‘Whole of Government Circular Economy Strategy’ was being finalised and would be open to public consultation in the coming weeks; the ‘Circularity Road Map for the Construction Sector’ will go live in Q4; and the fourth call for the ‘Circular Economy Innovation Grant Scheme 2025’ will go live in September.  Finally, we were advised that DECC is now the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment DCEE with Martina Hennessy appointed as Assistant Secretary for the Circular Economy. 

To set the scene, we heard from Angie Nagle, CEO of BladeBridge on their approach to innovation. BladeBridge is circular by design repurposing wind turbine blades for use as components in bridges, bike sheds, EV car charging units etc.  Angie called out the need for ongoing market validation in tandem with solution design. 

Peter Mooney from Dawn Meats, a seasoned innovator, gave a captivating presentation, highlighting the no nonsense approach to achieving project go ahead using the analogy of ‘show me the baby’ to refer to key leadership questions like ‘What do we have to do?   How much will it cost?   What are we getting out of it? 

While detailed research is needed to get to this point, without the answers to these questions, a project will never get the go ahead. 

An outdoor ‘Innovation Bingo’ session allowed all participants to learn about the challenges other members are tackling and helped identify potential partnerships and collaboration opportunities. 

Members were then guided through the first divergence and convergence steps of the problem definition phase by Sophie.  Laura explored personas and some interesting new AI solutions and primed the group for the deeper dive that will follow to explore, prototype, test and iterate solutions. 

Thanks to all the cross sectoral member companies who took part in workshops. It was glorious to be outdoors for some of the sessions. 

Finally, a big thank you to IMR’s Kevin Fraser for presenting to members on the opportunity posed by the upcoming SustainFit Programme. 

Don’t forget, our next in person invite only member event will be held in Glasgow on the 9th and 10th of September. Our collaboration with Zero Waste Scotland will involve multiple site visits and CE innovator exchange. Watch this space!