Sustainability Excellence Associate and Sustainability Excellence Professional Circular Economy & Bio-based Resources: practice questions

1 · Biological and technical cycles · hard

Why does the circular economy favour service models for products designed for the technical cycle?

1. Service models allow technical materials to be composted safely at the end of their working life
2. The provider keeps ownership and so has an incentive to design for durability and recovery
3. Ownership by the user is illegal for technical products under ecodesign law
4. Service models remove the need for any reverse logistics or collection systems

2 · Biological and technical cycles · medium

A pesticide container stewardship scheme asks farmers to triple-rinse empty containers before return. Why?

1. Rinsing converts the container into a biodegradable material that composts in the field within one season
2. Rinsing increases the container's mass so that the producer meets a weight-based target
3. Rinsing is needed only to remove the label so the container can be resold for food use
4. Rinsing removes residues so containers can be handled and recycled as non-hazardous plastic

3 · Material flow analysis and resource-efficiency metrics · medium

A country has domestic extraction of 500 Mt, imports of 200 Mt and exports of 150 Mt. What is its domestic material consumption (DMC)?

1. 700 Mt
2. 850 Mt
3. 550 Mt
4. 450 Mt

4 · Food waste valorisation and biorefineries · medium

Lignocellulosic biomass such as straw or bagasse is made mainly of which three components?

1. Starch, protein and oil
2. Cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin
3. Pectin, chitin and keratin
4. Glucose, fructose and sucrose

5 · Bio-based and biodegradable materials: claims and evidence · hard

PLA is made by polymerising lactic acid (C3H6O3, 90.08 g/mol), with each unit losing one water molecule to give a repeat unit of 72.06 g/mol. What is the maximum PLA from 1 kg of lactic acid?

1. 1.00 kg
2. 1.25 kg
3. 0.20 kg
4. 0.80 kg

6 · Extended producer responsibility and eco-design · medium

In an EPR scheme, what are eco-modulated fees?

1. Fees that rise each year with inflation regardless of the design of the product
2. Fees paid by municipalities to producers for collecting their packaging
3. Fees that are lower for easily recycled designs and higher for hard-to-recycle ones
4. Fees charged only to importers, so that domestic producers pay nothing

7 · Circular business models · hard

Why does a product-service system not automatically reduce environmental impact?

1. Service contracts are always longer than product lifetimes, so goods are kept in service far too long
2. Product-service systems are forbidden from using remanufactured parts by contract law
3. Product-service systems always require new products to be manufactured for each user
4. Rented goods are sometimes treated carelessly and providers still profit from frequent replacement

8 · Circular business models · medium

What is the main economic barrier for circular business models that recover by-products from many small farms and shops?

1. The cost of reverse logistics for collecting small, dispersed and variable quantities
2. The absence of any demand for recovered materials in every market worldwide
3. The legal ban on selling any product made from a by-product in most countries
4. The fact that recovered materials always cost more than virgin materials to process

9 · Circularity indicators and policies · medium

A product has a linear flow index (LFI) of 0.60 and lasts 1.5 times the industry average with average intensity of use. Using MCI = 1 − LFI × 0.9/X, what is its material circularity indicator?

1. 0.46
2. 0.64
3. 0.40
4. 0.19

10 · Food waste valorisation and biorefineries · medium

Which order follows the food waste hierarchy from most to least preferred for surplus bread at a bakery?

1. Compost, digest, use as animal feed, donate to food banks, prevent overproduction
2. Prevent overproduction, donate to food banks, use as animal feed where legal, digest or compost
3. Incinerate with energy recovery, donate to food banks, prevent overproduction, then compost the remaining crusts
4. Donate to food banks, landfill, prevent overproduction, use as animal feed where legal