Cross Industrial Parts Interchange: A Proposal for Manufacturers in a Green Economy
Introduction
The 50% Doctrine: For any individual part that is used in one application that, once its useful life therein is exhausted, can then be transferred to another application and function appropriately therein, the resources necessary to produce said part are reduced by fifty percent.
In other words, the redirection of any part in a durable or non-durable manufactured good of a particular weight, from its useful life in an initial, or first generation application, to another application, or second generation application, that would have otherwise required the production of another, identical part of the same weight and dimensions, reduces the total weight, production waste, emissions and post-life discards by half. The first and second generation applications can be entirely different from one another.
Parts can include packaging, design, or mechanically functional pieces, and can be redirected thusly:
- Packaging to packaging - Packaging to design - Packaging to function (function referring to a movable part that together with assemblage of other parts work together to perform tasks) - Design to packaging - Design to design - Design to function - Function to function - Function to packaging - Function to design
This is the basis of Cross Industrial Parts Interchange (CIPI). There must be trillions of preexisting, utilized parts, the fruits of the last 100+ years of production that could be utilized in this manner; a streamlined method for implementing CIPI involves examining and identifying manufactured parts with the following qualifying elements:
- The part has functional purpose in an existing application (the first generation).
- The part is similar enough to a part in another application (the targeted second generation) such that it can be modified to: function in the second application with some alteration to the part in the initial application, without affecting its performance in the initial application, so that it can function seamlessly in the second application, or function in the second application as is with some change to the apparati accepting the part in second application, or
- will function in the second application with some change to the part in the initial application and changes to the apparati accepting the part in the second application. Wear and tear and normal abuse would have to be considered both in terms of useful life and safety in a logical succession of parts interchange - a mechanized part that has been tested to have a certain life in, for example, an airplane engine, would be a candidate for a packaging or design part thereafter, and certainly not the reverse. On the other hand, a packaging part from a toner cartridge that is normally discarded and not included in the recycling of the rest of the toner cartridge may very well function safely as a plastic part of one of the seats inside the very same airplane.
Implementation
A large company that manufactures a variety of products with parts and packaging facilities under one roof would most likely be the first and easiest environment for implementation, where a company with geographically distant facilities would be faced with transport. And that would certainly be the case in the event of the ultimate goal of CIPI - across industries, which translates into a collaboration of multiple companies. But as seen with some of the take-back systems for glass bottles, which still include consumer incentives for return, as well as the take back of many forms of toner ink toner cartridges, cell phones, and batteries, redirection is certainly not out of reach.
Could it be the Future?
Here is where the economic issues of and profit and loss can be considered, to a company's, or network of companies' benefit. I foresee the day when different companies from the same or multiple and very diverse product lines sit down together to map out their flow of parts usage. And it would greatly enhance implementation of the spreading use of Extended Producer Responsibility concepts.
There should be great benefits to any thought on this matter as it not only could help save our eroding environment's natural resources and sustainability, but provide a new level of savings and means of creating financial resources. It could eliminate production redundancies and waste outputs that may not have been originally perceived. There could be a boom in new intellectual property rights along the way, and a whole new set of services and jobs. Such an endeavor as this would never hinder the creation of capital, and actually might lead to its explosion in an ever growing greener economy.
Check back to http://www.sprayallcorp.com for more CIPI Information, which will follow with real-world examples involving existing, utilized parts.
In 1992 John joined "Earth Village Institute," a start-up level intentional community dedicated to living in harmony with the environment, self sufficiency and sustainable agriculture, incorporating passive solar and wind power into the designs of the structures. He worked with Terra Dome Corporation, a "landscape friendly" building concept that saved energy and minimized impact. Contact info at: http://www.sprayallcorp.com
