JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #68 Special JEC Asia - October 2011 - 30

sustainability

national association to promote exchanges regarding this method and to inform the public about its implementation. These carbon inventories are subsidised by ADEME.

Examples of Bilan Carbone® inventories for companies in the composites sector
The European partners have undertaken to reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 20% between 2008 and 2020. The objective of the Bilan Carbone® (carbon inventory) method is to measure these emissions and adopt a plan for their reduction. In France, the legal obligations derive from the "Grenelle II" environmental initiative, which makes the Bilan Carbone® mandatory for companies with over 500 employees. This may be expected to be extended over time. The examples below are taken from real cases of Bilan Carbone inventories but have been adapted. The first step consists in collating all the data characterising the company's activities, from the purchasing of raw materials to the consumption of energy through waste generated from operations and the distances travelled by employees. These data are converted into GHG emissions (carbon equivalent tonnes or tonnes equivalent CO2), and classified in emission categories for the company. The calculations are made using the latest version (6.11) of the Bilan Carbone® tool from ADEME. 1- Small company using hand layup, spray-up and vacuum-assisted RTM technologies.

Structure of approximately 15 million turnover, electrical people, €1 million turnover, main engineering and railway markets: trucks and industry. equipment markets, compression press and The company’s global emissions thermoset injection moulding. are 3,560 tonnes equivalent Its global emissions are 12,560 CO2, distributed as in figure 1. tonnes equivalent CO2, distributed as in figure 2: 2- Hot press, compression & injection moulding company To ensure the reduction of the Company of 150 employees, €30 "carbon footprint", the chosen
Fig. 1: Company with 150 employees in the composites industry Contribution of each item to the total Fig. 2: Company with 15 employees in the composites industry Contribution of each item to the total

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jec composites magazine / No68 October 2011

action plans focus on the following main areas (for reasons of confidentiality, the details are not given): - Energy consumption: new energy management strategies. - Product design: implementation of an ecodesign plan for products, promoting disassembly, recycling and end-of-life management of the products sold (rolling stock and electrical engineering equipment). - Use of recycled materials: in certain cases, the use of recycled materials may reduce emissions by 3.5%. - End-of-life products: processing end-of-life products via disassembly, recycling of separate materials and the creation of a recycling platform with the help of the French plastics processing federation (GPIC). - Personal travel: action plan to reduce emissions generated by employee travel, based on the creation of a car-sharing website for the zone, negotiation with the public authorities to change public transport arrangements, etc. In all cases, the sensitivity calculations bring to light the non-negligible impact of the variations in the price of fossilfuel energies and in the rate of the dollar, with an impact on the price of raw materials. Action plans for helping companies prepare for these risks will be drawn up. A carbon tax system has also been simulated. It has a major impact on profit margins (the EU plans to enforce the tax in 2013).
More information: www.f2c-consulting.fr
http://www.f2c-consulting.fr
JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #68 Special JEC Asia - October 2011

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