Sustainability and Circular Economy: How can SMEs become climate neutral?

At the end of June, the Institut für Produktionstechnik und -organisation gGmbH (IPTO) provided information on the dimensions and challenges of sustainability in production for small and medium-sized enterprises at a conference. The sustainability officers from ID, Lea Gottschalk and Jens Janke, took part. Their conclusion is mixed.

What sounds complex and complicated in theory is even more so in practical implementation – especially for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). That is why Lea Gottschalk and Jens Janke, both recently successfully qualified as SDG-Scouts® Business, listened carefully to the presentations at the IPTO conference at the end of June in Cologne and spoke with the other participants during the subsequent networking about the opportunities and risks of sustainability measures in industry.

Dr. Leenhard Hörauf from Miele & Cie, the Technology Center Drives (TCD) Euskirchen, presented a very concrete and positive example of a successful strategy in the circular economy. There, a recycling system for electric drives has been set up. The individual components of the electric drives are materially separated from each other, so that single-variety materials are then available. Furthermore, it is checked whether a refurbished (German: Renovieren) is possible in order to offer revised drives as spare parts.

However, the use of sustainable methods in the production chain is not so obvious everywhere. In order to determine its own CO2 balance and to find out what needs to be done to produce in a climate-neutral way, Effizienz-Agentur NRW offers the simple, free and web-based tool ecocockpit. There is also an introductory video to ecocockpit on YouTube.

Lea Gottschalk has entered the required data for the first two phases (direct and indirect emissions) and learned that ID is already in a top position with a value of 0 (zero = climate neutral) when using renewable energies and green electricity. The third part of the evaluation is about obtaining concrete information from suppliers and supply chains. For this, many SMEs first have to provide the time and personnel capacities. “The path to more sustainability in the company is not a short-distance sprint, but a marathon,” says Jens Janke. And Lea Gottschalk adds: “The beginning has been made and the next sustainability project at ID is already in the starting blocks.”