Development of design for remanufacturing guidelines to support sustainable manufacturing

Developing sustainable approaches to manufacture is a critical global concern. Key measures towards this include practicing design for environment (ecodesign), for example by improving remanufacturing efficiency and effectiveness. Remanufacturing is a process of bringing used products to a “like-new” functional state with warranty to match. Its significance is that it can be both profitable and less harmful to the environment in comparison to conventional manufacturing. Remanufacturing has a low profile in world economies and is poorly understood because of its relative novelty in research terms. However, environmental and competitive pressures are changing the global and business environment and this is fuelling interest in the practice. This paper provides the background to remanufacturing together with the findings from workshops recently undertaken in the UK as part of research into design and manufacturing approaches to facilitate remanufacturing.