Ressourceneffizienz

The amount of resource efforts prevails with 46 % all other cost factors within classic manufacturing structures. Focusing on energy and labor costs as a source of raising companies profit seems no longer useful. Today, material costs of the manufacturing industry are about 500 billion euro per year, connected with a saving potential about approx. 100 billion euro. Also the belonging for sustainably produced products is still raising and is becoming a factor for a guaranteed purchase. Small and medium-sized enterprises fitted attempt, which helps increasing the transparency of internal processes and allows a resource driven ecological and economical assessment, is the main subject of this article.

Companies implement numerous measures to reduce the use of materials and energy in order to increase the resource efficiency. Resource efficiency has to be assessed over the whole lifecycle of a product. Therefore, an approach is requested which assesses the impacts of measures on the production and the use phase of a product.

The current discussion on sustainability lacks a firm foundation on a clear and unambiguous definition of this pivotal concept. This impedes a concentrated discussion among scientists as well as politicians and managers on a subject-matter concerning the future of mankind. It gives room for hollow commitments of companies claiming publicly to be „green“. The article therefore starts by proposing a clear and unambiguous definition which can fill this gap. Based on this preliminary work the author argues that logistics cannot become sustainable if it remains in a position where it only has to ensure the demands of other departments’ means (especially those of marketing) thus neglecting fundamental interdependencies. Logisticians often claim systems thinking as the dominant perspective of their work. Based on a practical example the author shows that systems thinking can only work as a door opener to sustainability if it is applied to the company as a whole.

Over the last decades, the cement industries achieved significant efficiency enhancements in their production processes. The so-called “co-processing”, the use of waste as a source of energy and raw material, was found to be both ecologically and economically beneficial. Cement plants can partially replace all fossil fuels by alternative ones and thus achieve significant reduction of cost and carbon footprint. Yet, in this context special challenges regarding supply chain management emerge. While respecting goals like quality, cost and delivery reliability, changing conditions need to be considered. Examples may be new regulations and the question of waste availability at nearby located industries as well as the desire to engage in long-term supply relationships. This article shows the relevant interrelations and presents approaches in order to contribute to a more efficient development of these supply chain relationships.

In many industries the success of companies depends on efficient and sustainable processes: In which way higher output can be achieved by less resource consumption? Many process optimization projects improve single processes but not the whole process chain. Thus a high amount of potentials of resource efficiency are unutilized in manufacturing. For realising enormous achievements energy and resource efficiency have to be integrated into the optimization process.