Live Speech – Asia Pacific Circular Economy Hotspot 2026
The Hon. Matt Kean
Chair – Climate Change Authority
Check against delivery.
May I acknowledge the Traditional Owners, the BID-ih-guhl people of the Eora nation where we are today, and pay my respects to their elders, past and present.
Thank you to the event organisers and Lisa Mclean – a brilliant leader, for the invitation to speak and participants involved with this morning’s focus on how circular economy efforts can help solve the climate challenge.
I’d particularly like to acknowledge John Thwaites, John has been working t the intersection of climate policy, economic reform and sustainability for decades. His leadership of the Circular Economy Ministerial Advisory Group helped move this conversation beyond waste, toward a much bigger question: how do we get more economic value from fewer resources?
Because ultimately, it makes economic sense to extract more value from the materials and resources we use, create new industries and jobs, and give Australia a mover advantage.
- For example, the Advisory Group reported recycling creates three times more jobs than landfill.
It also makes environmental sense – it’s the right thing to do if you believe we have an obligation to hand the natural environment to our children and grandchildren in a better state than we found it.
And it makes climate sense. A circular economy and zero waste can play a significant role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
That’s why I also want to commend the work of everyone involved in the Asia Pacific Circular Economy Roundtable in recent days.
There is a compelling case for ensuring zero waste and circular economy ambitions are a feature of deliberations at COP31 and beyond.
And it’s encouraging to see it emerging as a priority area within the COP31 Action Agenda.
It’s not just a major issue for Australia, though I will return to some of the insights and analysis of the Climate Change Authority in a moment.
It’s also crucial to our friends in the Pacific, who are among the most vulnerable nations on earth to the impacts of climate change.
And we cannot ignore the persistent warnings that tell us that the carbon clock is ticking faster than ever before.
Just last month, the United Nations Environment Program forecast global temperatures will likely exceed a 1.5 degrees Celsius increase in the next few years.
Every fraction of a degree beyond that threshold brings increasing climate risks, impacts and the likelihood of crossing dangerous tipping points.
It confirms what the climate scientists have warned us about for decades and makes clear that there is no time to waste.
It’s one of the reasons the Climate Change Authority has said we need to remove every ounce of greenhouse gas emissions we can from our economy today to make the cumulative task easier.
A lot of the public debate about the work of the Climate Change Authority zeroes in on the task of decarbonising the electricity sector.
In many ways, that makes sense.
Electricity generation is the single largest source of emissions in Australia, and decarbonising our grid is the largest source of near-term abatement. The electricity sector accounted for around half of the nation’s total emissions reductions in 2025.
And a grid built on clean energy helps turbocharge decarbonisation across other sectors of the economy, such as transport, where there are growing opportunities to switch from fossil fuels to clean electricity.
The electricity sector is the main game in town, but it can’t be the only game. Because net zero is not only an energy transition, it’s also a materials transition. We need to change not only how we generate energy, but how efficiently we use the materials and resources that underpin our economy.
Where we have technologies, fuels and other solutions available today, we need to deploy them at pace and at scale.
The opportunities presented by a circular economy fit that bill.
They’ve been considered by the Climate Change Authority in 2 reports: our Sector Pathways Review released by the Authority in 2024, and our 2035 Targets Advice.
I’d encourage everyone to digest those reports as they point to where early progress can be made.
And by improving circularity we can reduce emissions from the waste sector, which contributes around 14 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions each year.
Around three-quarters of those emissions comes from the methane produced by the decomposition of organic matter in landfill.
The rest comes from wastewater and biological and thermal waste treatment.
Diverting organic waste from landfill to low-emissions treatment options prevents the generation of methane and is an effective pathway to decarbonise this industry.
And it delivers additional climate benefits, given methane is a potent contributor to global warming in the near term.
When the United Nations Environment Program issued its report warning on the risk of overshooting a 1.5 degrees Celsius increase, it referenced methane as a priority for urgent emission reductions.
The Authority’s Sector Pathways Report identified that a mix of technological solutions are required, including composting and anaerobic digestion.
The good news is that many circular economy technologies don’t depend on future technological breakthroughs. They are available today. The challenge is scaling them. And circularity is bigger than recycling. It means using fewer materials in the first place, designing products to last longer, repairing and reusing what we can, and recovering valuable materials at the end of their useful life.
For example, an increase in the recycling of scrap metals can reduce the need for additional mining of raw materials, and the emissions involved in the smelting of iron and steel.
It helps lower our footprint today whilst we work on the broader range of emerging technologies and new fuels needed in harder-to-abate sectors.
There’s a good example of how the clean energy transition can support a more circular economy, and it flows from Australia’s status as a world leader in rooftop solar.
Earlier this year, the Government announced a solar panel recycling pilot.
With around 50 million solar panels expected to reach end of life by 2035, recycling will help reduce waste and recover valuable critical materials like copper, silver and aluminium.
There is also a major economic opportunity here. Australia has the fourth lowest materials productivity in the OECD. Put simply, we use a lot of resources for the economic value we generate from them. So, circularity isn’t about accepting less prosperity. It’s about getting more prosperity from every tonne of material we use.
Australia has the potential to become a global leader in sustainable products and meet the surging trade in green goods, which by some forecasts will quadruple by 2030.
Now, the challenge is to match our aspirations with a policy toolkit which is fit-for-purpose.
The Climate Change Authority has made the point, for example, that a mix of supply and demand-side measures to reform the design, planning and construction of buildings and infrastructure will have to be advanced.
Energy performance requirements, energy efficiency programs and construction codes that keep raising the bar are essential elements of progress.
And let’s remember: when we produce more energy-efficient buildings, we’re also giving households the benefits of lower energy bills.
We also now have the advantage of Australia’s Circular Economy Framework, which represents the nation’s first dedicated to the circular economy.
It was the culmination of work led by John Thwaites in his prior role as Chair of the Circular Economy Ministerial Advisory Group.
The Framework has an overarching objective of doubling circularity by 2035, a target now embedded in the Australian Government’s Net Zero Plan.
Modelling by CSIRO indicates that achieving the goal can add $26 billion a year to GDP, reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 14% by 2035 and divert 26 million tonnes of materials from landfill each year.
And earlier this year, the productivity commission delivered its final report on opportunities in the circular economy. It identified practical reforms: harmonising regulation, strengthening product stewardship, supporting innovation and using the governments purchasing power to help create markets for circular products. Australia is expected to spend around $270bn on public infrastructure over 4 years. That creates and enormous potential market for recycled and lower emissions materials.
All this work combines to give Australia a powerful set of policy levers to pull in the name of lowering our ask on nature, and increasing our prospects of success in the pursuit of net zero.
The link between a circular economy and emissions reduction is now indisputable.
Net zero isn’t only about changing how we generate energy. It’s also about changing how we produce, consume and value the resources around us.
The countries that learn to create more value from less energy and fewer materials won’t just cut emissions. They will build more productive, resilient and competitive economies. Australia should be one of them.
