Mapping sustainability and circular economy in cities: Methodological framework from europe to the Spanish case

Life in cities is accelerating towards a future in which they must be sustainable, healthy and resilient and to which they must add the circular economy (CE) as a new paradigm of sustainability. There is great interest in the use of indicators to assess urban sustainability, but no common solution is recognized due to the diversity of approaches and opinions. This article addresses this problem by proposing a methodological framework based on official tools in use, such as the European Reference Framework for Sustainable Cities (RFSC), the Urban Agendas and the CE strategies adopted by each country in the EU. This framework is intended to homogenize and simplify the existing world of sustainability and CE indicators in cities and, at the same time, reflects the complexity of the multi-conceptual, multi-level, multi-scope and multi-scale nature of the subject under study. This framework is developed in three phases to study and select the reference sources to create a map with a holistic and simplified approach, supported by a previous phase in which the specific environment of each territory was explored. In turn, the multi-scope implementation is carried out for Europe and Spain as a case study for testing purposes, resulting in a sustainability and CE map for Spanish cities. The methodological framework has relevance for a diversity of geographical areas due to its replicability and its adaptation to each local case. This last quality allows the indicators to be contextualized and, thus, their implementation in cities, towns, or any human settlement in general.