How can NFC help grow the Circular Economy ?

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I think the implementation of NFC tags in clothing is interesting. The article mentions handbag rental verification, additionally, it would be interesting to see clothing rental sites adopt NFCs, allowing customers to see how many times garments have been rented and where they’ve been rented.

While I can’t say I anticipate a widespread adoption of NFCs in garments, consumers are showing increased interest in brand transparency. The only brands that would be adopting the technology are brands that are confident in showcasing their zero-waste, recycling, or circular systems, which there aren’t too many to begin with. I could see a future where with enough bigger name brands taking transparency as far as the implementation of NFC tags, more brands could be incentivized to begin pursuing zero-waste or circular business models in order to maintain consumer interest/favor, therefore creating more standardization for environmentally conscious business practice in the fashion industry.

I’m skeptical of the environmental impact of NFCs, it seems with any new technology that promises to be a sustainable alternative, there is some sort of trade off. I can’t find much of anything on the negative environmental impacts of NFCs. They are made of metals like copper that are typically harvested through exploitive means

While this article focuses more on the fashion industry, NFCs could hypothetically be used on any product. Could NFCs be incorporated into ODNRs recycling systems to inform visitors on where their trash ends up? Or perhaps NFCs could somehow be incorporated into ODNR’s bucket program in order to increase bucket return rate?