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ECOLOGY
REPORT
Crafting Sustainable Practises
Executive Summary
1
When Sam Walton started Walmart 54
years ago, little did he know that he was on
the path of changing the face of the retail
store industry. Yet the foundations of a sus-
tainable industrial ecology that we practise is
as strong as ever. In this report we would like
to showcase the steps that we have crafted
to maintain a strong and sustainable industrial
ecology practise that we implement in our
factories, farms and stores with utmost ded-
ication. Our inhouse processes such as sus-
tainability score and life cycle assesment have
aided to diminish the negative impact on the
environment at the grassroot level as well as
at the retail one.
Executive Summary | 2
CONTENTS
Contents
3
Executive Summary 2
A Sustainable Profit 11
Conclusion 13
Table of Contents | 4
Currently, when products wear out or are replaced by
newer models, they are usually thrown away.
The Walmart Ecosystem
Life Cycle Assesment economic barriers, information legal barriers. The suitability of a
barriers, organizational obstacles, material for an intended reuse is
Metal goods, their com-
regulatory issues, and legal con- a key technical concern. Metals,
ponents, and other metal
cerns. When recycling is technical- metal compounds, and organic
products, especially those
ly feasible, it may be economically materials make up a large fraction
made of iron and steel, have a
unsound. When it is technically of industrial products. The metals
long history of being recycled
and economically satisfactory, a are relatively easy to reprocess and
without regulatory prodding.
lack of information may block its reuse. In many cases, however, or-
For other metal products and
adoption into the process. ganic materials are best thought of
materials, progress has come later
as energy stored in chemical bonds
and been much slower. Why is
Manfufacturing Strategies rather than as reusable materials v
there so much waste, especially of
Even when the requisite The choice between recycling
iron, steel, and precious metals, in
information is at hand, the material and burning it as fuel
the metal industry, which has such
organizational problems can or otherwise extracting its chem-
a long tradition of recycling? The
still stymie implementation. ical energy might be made on
barriers to industrial recycling of
Finally, when all else is satisfactory, the basis of comparative market
metals can be classified into six in-
a recycling scheme can founder on values. As products are redesigned
terrelated areas: technical hurdles,
the rocks of regulatory or other for newer more cyclical material
One of several Walmart factories Every product from Walmart gets a Sustainability Score
generally wants to separate things over. This obstacle may introduce materials must be balanced against
into their original components a time lag, postponing the deci- the cost of disposal. Disposal costs
and materials. There are costs sion to recycle until it is suitable bring up the question of how
involved in collecting, sorting, and to make a capital investment, such companies should take account of
transporting used-up products, as when the machinery requires indirect costs such as the effect of
scrap, and waste. Such separation change for some other reason. wastes on the environment. These
requires information, effort, and issues have generally been handled
energy, which must all be paid Sustainability Score by regulatory control of emis-
for. These costs must be compared Some companies that face sions but could equally be dealt
with the costs of new materials. competitive forces of ev- with by including the costs of
Even when the operating costs er-shorter product lifespans. environmental damage in a firms
of recycling are attractive, capital Those in the electronics industry, bookkeeping. The bookkeeping
costs may pose barriers. have introduced design for the approach would provide an incen-
Heavy capital investment in environment techniques as a ma- tive to minimize such costs, and
existing systems may prevent a jor impetus for reengineering their it might force a truer comparison
company from securing an easy products and processes. The cost of the costs of alternative schemes.
source of new investment to start of eliminating or reusing certain However, it has proved very diffi-
Designers generally
have no idea what 2010
waste problems
will be posed by
60
manufacturing with
different materials.
31
cult to find suitable, agreed-upon 29
measures for such costs. The
requisite information about costs
is not usually available to everyone 2012
in the firm who might be able to
use it to good advantage. Standard
management and other accounting
systems often do not track costs in
a way that is useful to designers. 33
Design engineers may not know
of the real costs to the company of 10
the materials they choose. wwww
65
The internal organization of a
firm can be difficult to change.
Changing the whole concept of
a product or adding new criteria 25 2014
for environmental compatibility
to the design process may not
fit the ideas on which the firm
operates or its internal incentive
system. The business structure
may make perception and solution
of problems that cross organi- Percentage of food materials recycled
zation lines very difficult. For Percentage of semi recycled materials
A Sustainable Profit
Handling Supply Chain appears to explain why firms often
choose to dispose of scrap and
Management
waste rather than seek users for
Under current legal practice, them. The following example from
liability considerations for a glassmaker is illustrative. Never-
a hazardous material often theless the glassmaker disposes of
favor its disposal over its sale these wastes in a landfill, because
or transfer for reuse. Liability is the legal counsel worries about
often targeted at the original seller
potential liabilities. Such liability
of any material used in a product
risks are hard to predict and quite
implicated in a damage suit, even
unacceptable in comparison with
if the material has been reused and
the more predictable liabilities
remanufactured by several parties
related to landfill disposal.
en route to that final product.
Some firms have already
The trail of potential liability
begun to design their products
can be so long and so unpredict-
and processes with a view to
able as to be thoroughly unpal-
closing material loops as much as
atable. A supplier of a generally
possible. However, if a product
harmless, minor component
is the transient embodiment of
material in a product might be
materials (a plastic water bottle for
assessed high liability damages
example), then closing the loop
because the product caused harm,
on those value-added materials
even if that supplier was not a
raises an important question for
party to the product design and
the firm: Is the product simply the
the material was not at fault. This
hardware being sold, or is it rather
practice has serious implications
the services it can provide ?
for commerce generally, and it
13 | Conclusions