Innovations in Manufacturing for Sustainability by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030032760
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

6 “Small Is Beautiful” Approach

“Small is Beautiful” is a new philosophy that intends to tackle the contemporary challenges of the metal casting industry incorporating resource efficiency (both in material and energy terms) and flexible production since the beginning of the design process. In addition to the mentioned characteristics, other critical aspects, such as profitability and responsiveness to market needs, are considered. Energy resilience is identified as the first step to address the mentioned challenges considering the energy -intensive nature of metal casting. In the longer term, a more comprehensive and holistic approach implementing all aspects of sustainability is envisaged.

The first steps in defining this new philosophy were focussed on capturing practices and comparing energy and resource efficiency studying 80 foundries, contacting 60 and visiting 10 of them. About 100 enterprises and industry experts were interviewed, and general energy data were collected. As a result, the need for a structured energy auditing framework and an effective visualisation tool of measurements able to integrate with existing manufacturing systems has been identified [7]. A concise overview of the key aspects comprising “Small is Beautiful” follows. The interested reader is invited to check the cited references to deepen his or her knowledge in this respect.

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