FOSTERING SUSTAINABILITY IN THE USE PHASE OF MATERIALS IN THE ALUMINIUM INDUSTRY

What is measured has a higher chance of being effectively managed. Indicators are measurement instruments and are therefore an important tool for fostering Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP). Effective indicators can reveal sustainability “hot spots” and focus attention on priority challenges and areas for improvement. For many product and material types the greatest sustainability challenges and opportunities are found in the use phase. Accordingly, increasing sustainability while products are in active use offers considerable opportunity for creating positive ecological impacts.  

 

Expert Workshop: Discussing and validating sustainability indicators

Identifying ways to measure use phase impacts was the aim of the “Fostering Sustainability in the Use Phase of Materials in the Aluminium Industry” project. As a first step, a desk study was conducted to identify sustainable development indicators for the aluminium use phase with a focus on the transport, building and packaging sectors.

 

Indicators may differ considerably in what they measure and in their reliability. Hence the CSCP held an expert workshop to discuss and validate the technical feasibility of the indicators proposed in the desk study. A number of issues were explored during the workshop including the suitability of different indicators for use phase sustainability and whether sustainability “hot spots” are shared among the transport, building and packaging sectors.

 

Stakeholder Workshop: Identifying how to best communicate impacts

Feasibility alone may be insufficient – communicating sustainability aspects of materials is equally important. Accordingly a second workshop was held to focus on stakeholders and their interests with respect to the three focus sectors. Indicators were discussed in the context of communicating use phase impacts with different stakeholder groups in light of their differing interest and needs.

 

Vital questions as to stakeholder communication included their interests/concerns regarding the use-phase of aluminium in each sector, the stakeholder interests that were addressed by the proposed sustainability indicators, and communication strategies that would be effective in reaching out to stakeholders groups.

 

Findings of the stakeholder workshop include, for instance, that consumers are primarily concerned with quality, convenience, solutions to recycling and deriving a positive feeling from their purchase. For policy makers, safety and waste (as part of sustainability) are most relevant. And for the industry (fillers/retailers) the opportunity to earn profit from sustainability initiatives as well as the availability of options was most important.

 

Next Steps

A final set of use phase sustainable development indicators (SDIs) will be developed by the European Aluminium Association. These SDIs, together with previously developed production phase indicators will be included in the next EAA Sustainability Report, planned to be released in November 2010.

 

Background

The project was jointly carried out by the CSCP and the European Aluminium Association (EAA).