Cleaner products, designing

SEEBA workshop on Supply Chain Management Meeting Electronics Customer Environental Requirements, 30 April 2003, Centre for Sustainable Design, Farnham, UK Envirowise (2001) ENDS Report 321, Envirowise revamp brings advice on cleaner product design, October 2001. Envirowise is funded by the UK Department of Trade and Industry. See www.envirowise.org Apple (2005) Apple states its environmental policy with respect to materials at http //www.apple.com/ environment/design/materials/selection. html... 

D) Cleaner Product Design => Materials Selection Minimising Quantity End Of Life Manufacturing Steps Manufacturing Process Life Cycle Analysis... 

A pesticide manufacturing plant should prepare a hazard assessment and operability study and also prepare and implement an emergency preparedness and response plan that takes into account neighboring land use and the potential consequences of an emergency. Measures to avoid the release of harmful substances should be incorporated in the design, operation, maintenance, and management of the plant. Implementation of cleaner production processes and pollution prevention measures can yield both economic and environmental benefits. 

Robert, K.-H., Schmidt-Bleek, B., Alois de Larderel, J. et al. (2002) Strategic Sustainable Development - Selection, Design and Synergies of Applied Tools. Journal of Cleaner Production, 10, 197. 

Providing technical support for the design, establishment, operation, evaluation, and monitoring of pollution prevention techniques and cleaner production processes and technologies... 

Wilson, B., Battery Design for Cleaner Production, The International Lead Management Centre (ILMC), NC, January 2001. 

In biomass transesterification it is necessary to develop (basic) catalysts with high conversion efficiency operating under heterogeneous conditions, which avoid the presence of catalyst residues in the final product and allow a cleaner product with concurrent savings of catalyst, as well as simpler separation of the reacted materials from the reactants, e.g., integration of catalysts and membrane in a new advanced reactor design. 

Expertise to help companies already exists in many countries. Companies who are adopting safer alternatives often contract outside help. Chemical producers have their own in-house research teams. Other institutes work with SMEs such as the European Cleaner Production networks and some Member States have well-established programmes that focus on sustainable product design and safer chemical use. 

The United Nations Industrial Development Organization [39-41] and Ausubel and Sladovich [4] emphasize the importance of cleaner production, pollution prevention, waste minimization, sustainable development, zero emission, materials substimtion, dematerialization, decarbonization, functional economic analysis, and IE indicators. These ways and means for analysis and design of industrial ecology are described separately herein. 

The terms of zero emission, zero discharge, cleaner production, waste minimization, pollution prevention, design for environment, material substitution, and dematerialization are all closely related, and each is self-explanatory. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA), the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), and other national and international organizations at different periods of time have promoted each [8,19,23,30-34,39-46]. 

Even though ChL is designed to offer advantages to the involved parties, until now ChL is no self-running process. An initiator and some catalysts" are necessary to start the reaction". Possible initiators are international organisations like UNIDO with a worldwide network of National Cleaner Production Centers but also companies which already successfully apply ChL might be a driving force for this business model. 

In designing, operating, and evaluating chemical plants and their products, the concept of cleaner production has a key role in improving environmental performance. An early definition of cleaner production states ... 

Process design Like other companies today, we are continuously working on cleaner production processes that need less raw materials and consume less energy . By way of examples mention is made of the use of GMOs in fermentation processes, and a new process for the reaction, purification and separation of antibiotics in a single piece of equipment. More specific examples can be found as part of the site reviews. 

Niinimaki, K., Hassi, L., 2011. Emerging design strategies in sustainable production and consumption of textiles and clothing. Journal of Cleaner Production 19 (16), 1876—1883. 

Bovea, M.D., Perez-Belis, V., 2012. A taxonomy of ecodesign tools for integrating environmental requirements into the product design process. Journal of Cleaner Production 20,... 

Lanoe, T., Simoes, C.L., Simoes, R., 2013. Improving the environmental performance of bedding products by using life cycle assessment at the design stage. Journal of Cleaner Production 52, 155—164. 

Electrolux, in Stockholm, Sweden, is reportedly using 40 to 80% commingled recycled plastics from sources such as used telephones, car parts, and other appliances, in the manufacture of vacuum cleaner housings. The company is also moving toward closed-loop reuse of in-plant scrap in future product designs,... 

Industrial ecology is a recent concept in engineering and management, and is an attempt to manage an industrial unit as an ecosystem, with feedback loops and the minimal use of resources and production of waste [7]. Life cycle assessment, which was designed to take into account the environmental impact of waste, can help achieve cleaner production technologies and sustainable waste management practices which are all important aspects of... 

Other household environmental problems are presented by the piano keyboard (Fig. 12-2) and the furnace humidifier (Fig. 12-3). Piano keys must be resistant to household chemicals, cleaners, foods, and perspiration. Organs played in night clubs often have melamine keys for improved cigarette resistance. Piano sharps require a scratch resistant material since the player may strike the keys with his fingernails organ sharps can be thermoplastic because the player rolls over the keys. Styrene acrylonitrile (SAN) is commonly used for natural keys and for telephone handsets that encounter the same problems. Bottle caps often crack (Fig. 12-4) when fastened extra tight and craze from exposure to environmental products, conditions, and lost liners. Products designed for laboratory or other use must be tested for their resistance to environmental chemicals as illustrated in Fig. 12-5. 

Products designed for use in the home, such as laundry and dishwashing detergents, hard-surface and all-purpose cleaners, are particularly complex because the formulator does not have control over how the consumer will actually proceed. Conditions vary not only from country to country, but also from household to household within the same country or neighborhood and even from day to day within the same household. On top of this technical complexity, additional economic and socionormative constraints result from competition between detergent manufacturers and different cleaning needs and habits respectively. 

---