Ida Mae de Waal is an Assistant Professor at the Utrecht Centre for Water, Oceans and Sustainability Law (UCWOSL). She is also part of the the project ‘Collaborative, Digitized and Integral Processes to Achieve Circular and Emission-Free Renovation’ (PACER). Ida teaches, researches and publishes regularly on legal aspects concerning the transition to a circular economy.
She holds a PhD (2024, cum laude) from Utrecht University. Her PhD research, titled ‘A Legal Framework for the Circular Economy in the European Union’, focuses on the role of coherence within EU chemicals legislation, product legislation and waste legislation in light of the transition towards a circular economy. The research includes three case studies covering electrical and electronic equipment, plastic packaging and batteries, which examined the implementation of this legislation in practice. The research describes how the EU legal framework can better incentivize higher R-strategies, such as reuse. It also explains how to make better use of the inherent interaction in the legislation governing the life cycle of products. In short, this research identifies legal barriers as well as incentives and opportunities to achieve a circular economy in Europe. Supervisors were prof. Chris Backes, prof. Marleen van Rijswick and prof. Marlon Boeve.