As a quick start guide, read through the top tips below to identify some of the areas in which resource efficiency can enable you to reduce your costs through minimising your resource use and waste whilst optimising your production.
- Improve housekeeping. An untidy factory is a wasteful factory.
Untidiness leads to mistakes, poor attitudes, accidental damage, obsolete
material and waste.
- Segregate to reduce costs. Cross-contamination of waste
streams can be a big problem if it leads to waste being disposed of at a higher
cost than necessary. For example, some automated systems in printing
plants mix white and printed waste, reducing the resale value by 70%.
- Pump/filter contents and tank washings can be recovered. In
paint making, once a good system is set up for recovering surpluses there is
an opportunity to recover a further 5 - 20 kg of product per batch and
reduce pump washing solvent usage at the same time.
- Don’t over-order materials. There is a common tendency in the
make-to-order environment to order more materials than required for the
job - even after allowing the standard amount for waste. The caution is
justified where waste is high and variable but better control of waste levels
permits lower stock wastage as well.
- Store more liquids in bulk - without investing in new tanks.
Material requirements can change but buying and stocking
policy often doesn’t. This can result in slow-moving liquid materials
occupying bulk tank capacity, while higher-volume items are bought in drums.
To see if there is a problem, list liquid materials in order of consumption and
compare the ten fastest-moving drummed products with the ten slowest moving
bulk products. The saving could be £90/tonne plus the wasted drum
residues, without necessarily requiring investment in more tanks!
- Schedule production to minimise the need for vessel washing between production batches and reduce the wash frequency.
- Recovering or re-using vessel washing liquors can bring significant reductions in effluent volumes and discharge costs, and can also reduce product loss.
- Reduce wastage from spillages and surplus material through using automated filling methods and using whole containers.
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