The automotive industry is confronted with increasing environmental issues associated with the growing worldwide fleet of vehicles. These issues include fuel consumption and emissions of the vehicle in use, as well as consumption of non-renewable material, generation of waste during production and disposal of vehicles at the end of life.
In response to these problems, new legislation and customer requirements have increased. These requirements underline the need for environmentally friendly innovation. The companies that can innovate, for instance, by offering solutions for recycling or end-of-life alternatives, can capitalize on a great business opportunity.
Worldwide progress in sustainable mobility and in environmental performance of automobiles can count many successful stories, a few of which are presented here.
SUSTAINABILITY. In the latter half of the 20th century, the market-driven economy has offered the citizens of Western countries "material well-being." The material well-being has been based on the exponential increase in the production of consumer goods.
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Worldwide, the growing environmental consciousness of lawmakers, customers and stakeholders has resulted in a proliferation of environmental legislation that covers the whole life of a manufactured item.
Vehicles and electrical and electronic equipment are two of the major focus of extended producer responsibility (EPR) policies, which are being implemented by government agencies in different countries around the world.
The European Commission has developed the End-of-Life Vehicle (ELV) Directive (Directive 2000/53/EC), enacted to address pollution resulting from vehicles that have reached the end of their useful lives. It is aimed at decreasing more than 8 million tons of waste generated by about 12 million cars that are scrapped each year. The legislation sets forth requirements for member states of the European Union to set legislation to encourage re-use, recycling and other forms of recovery of ELVs and their components
Approximately 25 percent of each ELV currently goes into landfills. The ultimate goal is to reduce this to a maximum of 5 percent by 2015. In order to achieve these targets, member states must have systems in place no later than 2007.
Although legislation is not in place, the statistics are similar in North America. Each year in the United States, 10 to 11 million vehicles reach the end of their useful lives and are taken out of service.
ELV recycling begins with the harvest of the reusable and refurbishable parts. This accounts for about 11 percent of the vehicle by weight. It also generates cash flow for dismantlers.
Once the most valuable parts of the vehicle have been removed, the remainder is typically shredded, and the ferrous metals are separated from the residue. The residue from the shredding operation, or ASR, amounts to around 14 percent of the vehicle. This consists of the plastics, fibers, foams and rubbers that are left over from the recovery of the metals. The recycling of components of the ASR is critical to the improvement in the environmental impacts vehicles at the end life.
The European ELV initiative has been embraced in many other parts of the world. Most of the environmental problems generated by ELV derive from the fact that vehicles are not designed and produced with a view to their dismantling, recycling and recovery. Obviously, any environmental design consideration that increases the value that can be recovered from vehicles at end of life will result in an environmental improvement, as well as an important source of cost savings for manufacturers.
To facilitate ELV recovery, OEMs are now requiring suppliers to input the composition of their parts into the Web-based IMDS system. This creates a database for determining the composition and, thus, the value of every vehicle. In the near future, OEMs will require an environmentally conscious design of parts; thus, the whole automotive supply chain will be involved. |
The aviator, explorer and writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry said, "We have not inherited the Earth from our parents; we have borrowed it from our children." Certainly, the problems of depletion of resources and environmental degradation have worsened.
To address this problem the concept of "sustainable development" has been introduced into our work and daily lives. Sustainable development seeks to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs.
Like most industries, the automotive industry is confronted with environmental issues. Among these, recycling or end-of-life alternatives represent a great business opportunity that has not been yet fully exploited.
LIFE-CYCLE THINKING. In order to improve the environmental efficiency of vehicles, all phases of vehicle life cycle shall be considered. Life cycle analysis takes into account all the environmental aspects that occur in the complete life cycle of a product.
Life cycle thinking is a holistic view: Design options should not have a reduced impact at one life-cycle stage at the expense of increasing the impact on the complete life cycle. Therefore trade-offs between design options, as well as between stages of the life cycle, have to be examined carefully.
To achieve the least environmental impact, it is important to be pro-active, improving products and processes starting from the very beginning of the design phases, where the degree of freedom is extremely higher. This puts the burden on the designers, product developers and R&D managers to drive the life cycle improvement.
Research has brought the innovative concept of eco-design, also known as Design for Environment (DfE). DfE aims at providing main design directions for creating, developing and improving environmentally sound or "eco-friendly" products.
Eco-friendly parts start with raw materials. Recycled materials should be favored, especially if generated from automobile disposal. This closes the loop in the part’s life cycle.
ACOUSTIC EXAMPLES. Automotive acoustical parts have historically used eco-friendly raw materials because of economic considerations.
Damping composites are used in acoustical treatments to reduce the vibrations in the automobile’s sheet metal. Typically these will incorporate byproducts such as asphalt, fly ash and limestone fines. They may also include wood fiber recycled from newsprint. Some of these materials would end up in landfills if they were not used in the damping product.
Acoustical de-couplers and absorbers are often made using recycled apparel fibers and urethane foam chips. Paint powder waste from spray operations may also be used in these applications as a binder. Finally, polyester staple fibers made from recycled beverage containers are used extensively.
Thermal control parts often use recycled aluminum to isolate high temperature components from lower temperature components. Fiber made from steelmaking slag may also be used as an insulator. Again use of some of these materials reduces the amount of material being disposed of in landfills.
One recent part deployed is a thermoplastic under-floor panel made from polypropylene reinforced with glass fibers. If isolated by a dismantler, the part can be recycled.
Another part, a "headliner" that lines the roof of a vehicle, is being made with PET made in part from recycled PET bottles. The component is completely recyclable if isolated during dismantling.
Using tools such as life cycle analysis as well as some simple rules of thumb, designers can improve the environmental sustainability of an automobile. This approach can actually benefit automotive suppliers by giving them a competitive edge in today’s marketplace and serving as a springboard for low-cost innovations.
Author Francesco Schiavone is a PhD Candidate at the Università di Firenze in Italy. James Fisher is an engineer and Hameed Khan is a V.P.-research and development with Rieter Automotive North America. He can be contacted at hameed.khan@rieterauto.com.
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