Government programme saves the green pound

The End of Life Vehicle directive and Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment directive hold the producer responsible for product recovery at the end of a product’s life. The Restriction of Hazardous Substance in electrical and electronic equipment also has end of life product recovery at its heart. Cleaner design considers what happens to the product at the end of its life and then designs it so cost effective recovery, reuse and recycling is practical.

This involves identifying how a product impacts on the environment during its life-cycle. It extends to investigating how these impacts can be reduced through design, while satisfying customer requirements.

This approach designs out waste at the beginning of the process, improving efficiency and reducing production, distribution, use and end-of-life recovery costs.

There is currently a gap between businesses understanding the importance of achieving sustainability within their product development, and those actually accomplishing it. Envirowise, a Government programme providing free, practical advice to industry on how to improve environmental performance through cleaner design and waste minimisation, is stepping into that gap. Its Designtrack service offers a confidential site visit from a qualified designer who can help a firm identify areas that can be improved.

Fulleon, a south Wales-based manufacturer of break-glass call points and other elements for fire alarms, is one firm which set about applying the principles of cleaner design, and adopted a life-cycle assessment of the environmental impact of each stage of the product’s life-cycle.

“Cleaner design makes good business sense, good environmental sense and provides us with a tool that delivers a clear long term sustainable competitive advantage,” says Peter Maxwell, MD of Fulleon. By adopting cleaner design the firm has reduced manufacturing costs, improved product features and saved an impressive £92,650 a year while maintaining its market position. These savings came from an average reduction in material costs of 11 per cent, a reduction in labour assembly costs of 34 per cent and a reduction in the overall unit production cost of 21 per cent.

The cleaner design process reduced machining times and assembly times through product changes such as introducing snap fit components, using fewer parts and rounding the edges on some moulds. The firm also examined its packaging, and using plastic bags instead of cardboard boxes, reduced these costs by 24 per cent.

The environmental impact of the improved design is significant, with reductions in material consumption, energy use, cardboard packaging, transport costs and less waste at the end of the product’s life.

“There are other benefits beyond the savings we have made that improved our commercial position,” says Fulleon’s technical director, Dean Arnold.

Making similar sorts of savings is within the grasp of any company, and preparing for forthcoming directives may be the catalyst for many to consider a cleaner design approach. Envirowise is encouraging firms to examine the opportunities more closely, and as a starting point it has produced a series of free guides.

The first guide (Cleaner product design: an introduction for industry – GG294) is an introduction to cleaner design and takes you step by step through the process of introducing it to your company. The second guide (Cleaner product design: examples from industry – GG295) provides examples from industry and shows how nine companies have benefited from cleaner design.

The third guide (Cleaner product design: a practical approach – GG296) looks at cleaner design across businesses of all sizes and emphasises product disassembly and redesign. It includes instructions for carrying out a systematic dismantling exercise using a standard household item such as a kettle or an iron.

The Designtrack helpline is on 0800 585794. Philip Price works on the DTI’s Envirowise Programme. www.envirowise.gov.uk