'Green manufacturing' to be 'eco-friendly'

Prasad Sachintha MAPATUNAGE

A "green" production process refers to an effort to lessen the impact of the manufacturing process on the environment. In an environmentally mindful society, consumers and businesses look for ways to promote "green" business practices. This can include anything from a recycling program for employees, energy efficient appliances, supplies, machinery and other components, cautious resource use such as turning the lights off when not in use, reusing supplies to eliminate waste and refined manufacturing or production processes.

In fact, society, consumers can also support this notion by purchasing only from businesses or products that support this global effort. This sends a strong message to non-green companies that they should join the cause and reform their practices.

Think about this. If a business is not showing a serious effort towards green manufacturing process and energy efficient business processes, they may find themselves losing potential customers. Why risk that chance?

Companies also feel pressure from their competitors that have already joined in the green movement. After all, if the competitors can do it and gain market advantage, then why can't they.

Companies that take proactive steps towards environmental improvements in their production processes have a firm advantage over business that are not doing the same.

In a way, these companies are setting new standards for the production industry. They benefit on two levels, the first gaining a greener public view of the company which encourages consumers to buy environmentally friendly products.

The second is that adopting these new policies takes an initial investment, but in the end frees up more time for a company to develop additional methods for reducing waste, saving them both energy and money in the long run.

Most of our media focus on the green production efforts of larger corporations; however, many smaller businesses have established ecologically aware practices also. Many of the companies that tailor to goods or services for outdoor activities operate in environmentally friendly ways.

These types of companies tend to operate in geographical regions that are supportive of environmental protection so they may be more concerned to advertise their use of green production methods and philosophies.

Manufacturing plays a very strategic role in an organization, especially to build competitive advantage and improve performance. With rapid changes in technology, customer needs, globalization and manufacturing itself is constantly transforming and evolving. In beginning of the century, automobile industry introduce the a mass production techniques which revolutionized manufacturing processes.

Over the years the need for meeting individualistic customer demands without compromising productivity or quality, brought about the introduction of flexible and mass customization techniques.

The focus is now on Green manufacturing. Recent volatility in the price of fossil fuels and global awareness about the finite nature of our resources is creating the need for a more sustainable way of how we produce and use. Green manufacturing itself is not new. The concept has been around for a couple of decades, but has never received much attention from manufacturers except for participation in seminars and scoring well in polls and surveys.

However recent trends show that with the heightened focus on climate change, a transformation of mindset is happening and so positive action is now finally imminent.

What is Green manufacturing?

There are many interpretations of green manufacturing and all convey similar meaning. It is a system that integrates product and process design issues with issues of manufacturing, planning and control in such a manner as to identify, quantify, assess, and manage the flow of environmental waste with the goal of reducing and ultimately minimizing environmental impact while also trying to maximize resource efficiency.

Green Manufacturing is also known by plethora of different names: Clean manufacturing, environmentally conscious manufacturing, environmentally benign manufacturing, environmentally responsible manufacturing and Sustainable manufacturing. Irrespective of the various acronyms, the primary goal remains the same - designing and delivering products that minimize negative effects on the environment through their production, use, and disposal.

The fundamentals of green manufacturing are very simple and relate to minimizing the use of resources and the environmental impact of a product. This philosophy is extended to all the elements of its life cycle - from its design to its end of life.

There are tremendous opportunities which will arise with Green manufacturing. Each element of this cycle has the potential to be an industry by itself, given the rapid growth rate and demand it is expected to generate in the mid to long term.

Although it is very difficult to estimate the market size for green manufacturing, industry experts feel this would be very significant in the coming decade. As government, companies and consumers realize the importance of going green the barriers for investment in these technologies is expected to fall rapidly.

The drivers for green

There are many drivers which are expanding the boundaries for green manufacturing

1. Competitiveness: The natural desire of manufacturing firms to improve its processes and capabilities for competitive advantage. This can manifest in terms of technology, new product and process development as well as opportunities for business.

2. Corporate Social Responsibility: The growing pressure on manufacturing firms to become more responsible to the social and environmental impact it creates. Companies would like to brand themselves with a "green" image.

3. Legislation: Manufacturing firms have to constantly strive to meet current upcoming stricter environmental regulations.

The challenges

Although the benefits look very obvious, there are many challenges to go green. The most significant is the economic mindset and rationalities of organizations. And it cannot be denied that go green will be at an initial cost with potential savings coming much later. Another key challenge is that most companies have not integrated the process of continuous environmental management into the core of their business strategy, either because it conflicts with their existing priorities or simply because they are ignorant about how to do it.

Moreover companies do not have specific environmental performance indicators or social performance metrics by which they are measured their stakeholders.

Many firms today are engaged in some level of environmental management, however such solutions may not in themselves promote efficiency gains or improvements in productivity. This would further reduce incentive for deploying green manufacturing company wide.

The way ahead

The change to green manufacturing will not happen overnight but with over time. However we do expect a tipping point after which adoption will be very rapid, when it moves beyond a continuous improvement approach. Till today, firms have always operated on the concept of producing quality and technology products at lowest cost to achieve competitiveness. Manufacturing processes were designed to make products faster and better on purely economic terms.

The leap into green manufacturing will follow with the fundamental change in the way companies design, procure, manufacture, distribute, dispose and recycle their products. It has now been proved beyond doubt through increasing experience of companies implementing green manufacturing practices that the payback periods of such investment is generally 1 to 3 years.

But Industry by itself cannot bring about this change. Government has to play a very important role of creating the right environment in which adopters of green manufacturing do not lose competitive edge in the short term.

(The writer is studying international transportation and logistics management at the CINEC Maritime Campus at Malabe. The writer could be reached at prasadsachintha@rocketmail.com)