Improve material efficiency through an assessment and mapping tool

Material efficiency in manufacturing results directly in cost and energy savings in fabrication, transformation, transportation and disposal, as well as reduced greenhouse gas emissions through increases success rates of waste... [ view full abstract ]

Material efficiency in manufacturing results directly in cost and energy savings in fabrication, transformation, transportation and disposal, as well as reduced greenhouse gas emissions through increases success rates of waste management initiatives. Previous sustainability related studies on manufacturing companies indicated several barriers towards material efficiency and circular economy, including lack of a suitable tool for environmental initiatives, limited environmental motivation and engagement, lack of effective measures to evaluate sustainability, poor visualization and limited intra-organisational interaction. This paper aims to adjoin this functional gap via simplified Environmental Value Stream Maps (EVSM) to evaluate, measure and visualize material/waste flows of a limited operation in manufacturing. Two case studies were performed on (1) productive material flow (2) auxiliary material flows. Applying EVSM proved to be a practical solution to engage different organizational functions in material efficiency improvement, to visualize material and waste streams, to realize the value of wasted material and costs associated to waste handling and treatment, to define or update relevant KPIs and to support lean principles such as “go to gemba”. This paper contributes to the area of lean and green and circular economy through aiding manufacturing companies to better manage, measure and visualize industrial waste and material consumption in order to go up the waste hierarchy, reduce waste and material consumption.