Evaluation and Improvement of Sustainability in an Irrigation Pipes Plant

Abstract

In this project, the aim is to form a measuring model of sustainability in manufacturing enterprises which can be reliable for evaluating the performance of the enterprise. The focus of the research to reach this model was on social and environmental sustainability as firms usually direct more concern towards economic aspect of the sustainability. The proposed assessment framework was used to evaluate sustainability in a plastic irrigation pipes plant. It was found that the plant needs improvements in several aspects; first was filtration of water used in plastic washing tanks to reduce waste of water and improve environmental sustainability. Secondly, social sustainability can be improved through adding a safety shutdown mechanism for plastic shredding machine and proposing a ventilation system for plastic recycling department in addition to placing posters for work-related health and safety. The third aspect is related to economic sustainability regarding enterprise productivity which can be improved through upgrading perforator and insertion machines that formed bottlenecks for the production line. Finally, sustainability is re-evaluated in the selected enterprise to observe the changes created by the implemented solutions.