Digital Twins and the CIRC-UITS Circularity Toolbox

Digital technologies play a central role in enabling circular economy practices in the electronics and automotive sectors. Within the CIRC-UITS project, a comprehensive Digital Circularity Toolbox was developed to support companies in making informed sustainability and circularity decisions throughout the lifecycle of electronic products.

The toolbox integrates advanced digital technologies such as Digital Twins, Artificial Intelligence, simulation models, and data management tools. These technologies allow stakeholders to evaluate circular design options, analyse environmental impacts and optimise recovery processes for electronic components and materials.

The goal of the digital tools developed in CIRC-UITS is to enable manufacturers, recyclers and service providers to transition from linear production models toward data-driven circular value chains. By providing accessible and actionable information, the digital toolbox supports better decision-making in product design, manufacturing, repair, reuse and end-of-life processing.

The CIRC-UITS Electronics Circularity Toolbox

The Electronics Circularity Toolbox is one of the main technological outcomes of the CIRC-UITS project. It acts as a digital decision-support platform that helps companies evaluate circularity strategies for electronic products across their lifecycle.

The toolbox is designed as a modular system combining several digital components:

  • Data Layer: collects and manages information related to materials, components and product lifecycle data

  • Simulation and Digital Twin Module: creates digital representations of products and processes to evaluate circular scenarios

  • Distributed Advisory Services: provides decision-support tools and recommendations for circular design and end-of-life strategies

  • Advanced Human-Machine Interfaces: ensures that operators can access relevant information easily on the shop floor

  • Lifecycle Sustainability and Circularity Assessment tools: evaluate environmental and economic impacts of different design or recycling options

  • Marketplace Module: supports the exchange and reuse of electronic components and materials

Together, these tools enable companies to analyse circularity at every stage of the product lifecycle—from product design to recycling.

Digital Twins for Circular Electronics

A key innovation within the toolbox is the development of Digital Twin models for electronic components and systems. A digital twin is a virtual representation of a physical product or process that allows engineers and decision-makers to simulate different lifecycle scenarios.

In the CIRC-UITS project, digital twins were developed to analyse how electronic components can be designed and managed to support circularity. For example, digital twins were applied to automotive electronic modules such as Electronic Control Units (ECUs), enabling manufacturers to explore design alternatives that improve repairability, reuse and recycling.

Through these models, companies can test different strategies without physical prototypes. This allows them to assess key performance indicators such as:

  • product repairability

  • component reuse potential

  • recycling rates

  • material recovery efficiency

  • environmental impacts across the lifecycle

Digital twins therefore provide a powerful tool for integrating circular economy principles directly into product design and manufacturing strategies.

Simulation and Recycling Analysis

Another important component of the digital toolbox is the recycling simulation model, developed to evaluate the environmental performance of end-of-life treatment processes.

These models analyse how products behave during recycling and dismantling processes and estimate key indicators such as:

  • material recovery rates

  • recyclability of product components

  • losses and emissions during recycling processes

  • quality and quantity of recovered materials

The simulation models were applied across the four CIRC-UITS pilots to evaluate optimal recycling strategies for products such as automotive electronics, sensors and printed circuit boards.

This capability helps companies identify the most sustainable recovery options for their products and optimise disassembly and recycling processes.

Supporting Circular Value Chains

Beyond product-level analysis, the digital tools developed in CIRC-UITS also support the creation of digital circular supply chains.

By integrating data sharing, simulation and decision-support capabilities, the toolbox enables collaboration between different actors in the electronics ecosystem, including:

  • manufacturers

  • component suppliers

  • remanufacturers

  • recycling companies

  • waste management operators

This integrated approach improves transparency and enables more efficient recovery and reuse of valuable materials and components.

Benefits for SMEs

SMEs often face barriers when adopting digital solutions for sustainability due to limited resources or access to expertise. The CIRC-UITS digital tools help address this challenge by providing accessible, modular and scalable solutions that can support SMEs in implementing circular practices.

For SMEs operating in electronics manufacturing, repair, recycling or remanufacturing, the digital toolbox can help:

  • identify reusable components and materials

  • evaluate circular design strategies

  • optimise recycling and recovery processes

  • improve collaboration with partners across the value chain

  • reduce operational costs through more efficient resource use

By enabling SMEs to make data-driven circularity decisions, the digital solutions developed in CIRC-UITS contribute to strengthening Europe’s circular electronics ecosystem.