Barriers to energy reduction in manufacturing

Sustainability has become an important part of the culture of most organisations, with shareholders and customers demanding that companies operate in an environmentally responsible way. This research focuses specifically on one aspect of industrial sustainability: energy reduction in manufacturing. This research explores the management and organisational barriers within a manufacturing organisation, which prevent it from either implementing reductions in energy usage, or from realising the full benefit from them. The existence of these barriers is tested by collecting data on the perceptions of individuals within a UK facility belonging to a large aerospace manufacturing organisation, and by observing the progress of energy reduction projects in this facility. Data is collected through interview, questionnaire and by direct observation of the actors within this facility who are engaged in energy reduction activities. Three case studies are presented focusing on projects to reduce the energy consumed by the surface treatment and machining of aluminium aircraft parts. Building from the literature, a list of twenty barriers to energy reduction is developed and illustrated through these case studies. By analysing the narrative of these case studies it can be seen that these barriers are linked causally. This causality implies that a smaller number of key barriers will act as root causes of the larger list of barriers and is a main contribution of this work. The key barriers are found to be a lack of accountability and a lack of ownership. The causality is exploited by proposing that interventions to overcome these key barriers will remove or diminish the effect of the other barriers. The first intervention proposed is that objectives be set for Manufacturing Operations to ensure that it is functionally accountable for its energy consumption. The second intervention is that a focal point be nominated to own the resulting activities and be given appropriate resources to meet the objectives.