Cradle to Cradle: Effective Vision vs. Efficient Practice?

Cradle to Cradle is a development paradigm with a focus on eco-effectiveness; improving the ‘positive footprint’ in contrast to the more conventional eco-efficient approaches; reducing the ‘negative footprint’. Industry is supported in their Cradle to Cradle efforts by an elaborate five level certification framework. The accredited institutes necessary for certification focus in practice mainly on material health, underexposing other aspects. The aim of this paper is to explain why the eco-effective Cradle to Cradle vision in practice results in a mere eco-efficient approach by discussing several conflicts between theory and practice. This is illustrated with a case study resulting in a development method for Cradle to Cradle compliant packaging.