BUILT AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES: Cleaner Production Strategy

This essay delves into the Cleaner Production Strategy as a means of fostering sustainable communities. It begins by defining the strategy, which focuses on preventative and integrated environmental approaches to optimize manufacturing processes, minimize environmental damage, and reduce risks to both the environment and humans. The essay highlights the strategy's purpose: to identify resource losses in the form of pollution and waste, and to suggest ways to minimize these losses, benefiting all stakeholders. A case study of a dairy plant in the Netherlands demonstrates the practical application of the strategy, detailing specific improvements in waste management, energy consumption, and pollution reduction. The essay also addresses the internal and external barriers to implementing the Cleaner Production Strategy, such as traditional business philosophies, limited financial resources, and the availability of advanced technologies. The essay concludes by emphasizing the importance of overcoming these challenges to effectively implement the Cleaner Production Strategy for a more sustainable future.

Running head: BUILD AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES
BUILD AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES
Name of the Student
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Author Note

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Introduction
The main purpose of this discussion will be to select one of the strategies that have
emerged with the aim of addressing the issues which are impacting the sustainability of
communities. The selected strategy of this essay is Cleaner Production Strategy. The purpose
of the strategy will be discussed in this paper along with an example where this strategy or
concept has been applied. Apart from all these, discussion will be laid on whether the
selected strategy has been successful in addressing the issues which are having impacts on the
sustainability of communities like the provision of adequate food and water supplies, suitable
transport and housing, reducing energy emissions, addressing issues associated with climate
changes and lots more.
Selected Strategy
As discussed earlier, the selected strategy is the Cleaner Production Strategy. The
meaning of this strategy is the overall application of a preventive as well as integrated
environmental strategy towards the products, services and processes which is required to
increase or maximize the overall efficiency of the entire system of manufacturing process and
reducing the damage along with the risks associated for the environment as well as for
humans. It can be said in other words that Cleaner Production Strategy involves the overall
process or system to produce or manufacture the services or the products with the system
which will have no or less impact on the society or community to whom the product or the
service is going to serve or are already serving (Almeida et al 2017).
Purpose
This strategy helps in identification of the reasons of why and where an organization
are losing their resources in the form of pollution or waste, which may have used or re-used
in some other ways which would have make betterment of the society as well as the society.
This strategy also helps to suggest the ways through which these losses can be minimized.
These will provide benefit to all the parties involved in the entire process of manufacturing a
product or designing a service. Production of less waste will improve the productivity of the
organization and will help to enjoy the competitive advantage over others. In addition, it can
be sad that Cleaner Production Strategy will help to add value to the entire environmental
management system, as this strategy outs the emphasis on prevention of the causes of the

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pollution rather than controlling it. This provides a clear improvement in the overall
environmental performance of the institutions or parties which are involved n the
manufacturing process. It suggests the ways through which it can be said that this strategy
insists in the ecologically sustainable growth of the organization.
Cleaner Production Strategy also includes the protection as well as safety of health of
the people or the employees engaged in the production process of a business entity. This
strategy also lays stress on the reduction of risks along with improvement in the immediate
efficiency and the long-term efficacy within the organizational culture of the organizations
that are following Cleaner Production Strategy. If the emissions of wastes and pollution can
be minimized, the entire society or the community will be benefitted from this strategy. Apart
from improving the quality of the products and the services, this strategy also helps to reduce
the risk or liabilities involved with the manufacturing process of that service or product. This
helps to improve the brand image of the organization associated with this strategy, which, in
turn, helps to improve the competitiveness of that organization in the market place where it is
serving. Apart from all these, the safety and healthy related issues are also addressed by the
implementation of the strategy of Cleaner Production, which motivates the employees or the
workers to improve their performances, which will improve the overall productivity of that
organization (Eras et al 2013).
Case Study of Cleaner Production Strategy
An assessment of Cleaner Production was carried out in a dairy which is located at
Netherlands. This case study gives an example of the process of carrying out the assessment
that has proved to be successful. The Dutch organization involved in this case study was
Campina Melkunie Maasdam, which is a producer of a wide variety of yogurt, custard and
other milk products. This was a part of the PRISMA project which clearly stated the
following opportunities (Bönte and Dienes 2013):
 Emptying the production tanks in a better way;
 Eradication of rinsing among yogurt batches;
 Reduction of rinsing at the change-over of a product;
 Developing the operations related to cleaning process; and
 Restoring low-grade heat.
Description of the Process:

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After the milk reaches the plant, it is pasteurized, blended and then packaging is done
according to the desired end product. Some of the milk is further processed for the production
of custard, yogurt and buttermilk. If the product clings to the interior surfaces of the
equipment during the production procedure, the quality of the product may get deteriorated.
In order to avoid this issue, cleaning and sanitizing is done to the whole process after every
day of production using hydrogen peroxide, peracetic acid, sodium hydroxide and other
agents.
Environmental conditions:
Similar to other dairy plants, a warm liquid substance comprising of milk elements
and agents of cleansing and sanitizing is generated by this plant too. About 130,000 liters of
liquid waste is discharged annually which gets mixed directly with the surface water bodies
due to the absence of a proper wastewater treatment system (Ingrao et al 2016). Due to the
burning of fossil fuels for generating steam in the boiler, huge quantities of toxic gases like
PAHs, CO, CO2, NOx etc. are emitted, thus causing air pollution. In addition to these, three
more chemically waste liquid streams are generated that includes laboratory wastes, ink and
solvents. But above all the solid wastes accounts to be the largest in number which are
generated from the packaging materials of the milk products.
Implementation of the strategy and its results:
Identification of the sectors were done where the largest quantity of emissions and wastes
were generated. The first concern was the huge loss of products to the emerging stream and
usage of cleaning elements. Improvements were done regarding the procedures and practices
of emptying the tank. Moreover, rinsing was reduced, stopped between the yogurt batches as
well as the processes of cleaning were developed and optimized. But still there is a
requirement for the replacing the cooling installation, reusing the sour products and
developing substitute agents of cleaning materials. Another matter of concern was the
problem regarding high consumption of energy needed for both cooling and heating
procedures. To avoid and reduce this issue custard was heated and butter-milk was also pre-
heated during the production process. Though, pre-heating method for production of yogurt
still needs to be implemented. Additionally, and the ink-ejector was also replaced to reduce
liquid waste generation. Among fourteen preventive measures of pollution reduction, eight
were implemented that resulted in:
 3.4% decrease of product loss;

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 23% savings in chemical consumption;
 5.5% decrease in pollution load; and
 Saving in the consumption of natural gas.
Barriers or Challenges
From the above example and the understanding of the Cleaner Production Strategy
and its purpose, there are many barriers or challenges that the organizations have to face on
implementation process of this strategy. The barriers are divided into internal barriers and
external barriers.
Internal Barriers
One of the most vital barriers of implementing this strategy is the traditional
philosophies that are used by the Chief Executive Officers, mainly due to low awareness
programs relating to this strategy or concept and the values that will be achieved by the
organization. They are not aware about the usefulness of this strategy into the manufacturing
system of their organization, and continue to use their own techniques, through which the
hazardous wastes are generated from the manufacturing processes. Initial constraints within
the internal organization and communication systems also act as a major barrier for
implementation of this strategy. Limited information regarding data, information and
expertise on the emission of wastes are also the major challenges of an organization in the
way of using this concept of Cleaner Production.
Due to the advancement of modern technology, the business houses are competing
with each other to gain the competitive advantage over others. The business goal or aim on
having short term profits and end of pipe solutions also acts as a barrier in the way on
implementation of this strategy. The usage of outdated, missing and unreliable
instrumentation process also hampers the usage of Cleaner Production Strategy within the
manufacturing processes of an organization, and causes generation of pollution and wastes in
the areas of their manufacturing units, and destroys the ecological balance of that area as well
as its surrounding area.
External Barriers
The major external barrier of implementing this strategy within the organizational
process is the availability of investment capital. It can be stated that usage of Cleaner

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Production Strategy requires a healthy amount of money, and many organizations do not
possess that financial structure to implement these kinds of strategies. Another major barrier
is the availability of Cleaner Production technologies. If the technologies need to be
implemented in order to use this strategy, then again it will require a good financial structure,
which cannot be afforded by many of the organizations around the world (Vieira and Amaral
2016).
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be concluded that Cleaner Production Strategy is an
important concept that need to be followed by the organizations who are engaged in
manufacturing of products or services, but for that, they need to overcome the challenges.
Then only they will be able to implement the strategy of Cleaner Production.

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References
Almeida, C.M., Agostinho, F., Huisingh, D. and Giannetti, B.F., 2017. Cleaner Production
towards a sustainable transition. Journal of Cleaner Production, 142, pp.1-7.
Almeida, C.M.V.B., Agostinho, F., Giannetti, B.F. and Huisingh, D., 2015. Integrating
cleaner production into sustainability strategies: an introduction to this special
volume. Journal of Cleaner Production, 96, pp.1-9.
Almeida, C.M.V.B., Bonilla, S.H., Giannetti, B.F. and Huisingh, D., 2013. Cleaner
Production initiatives and challenges for a sustainable world: an introduction to this special
volume.
Bönte, W. and Dienes, C., 2013. Environmental innovations and strategies for the
development of new production technologies: empirical evidence from Europe. Business
Strategy and the Environment, 22(8), pp.501-516.
Eras, J.J.C., Gutiérrez, A.S., Capote, D.H., Hens, L. and Vandecasteele, C., 2013. Improving
the environmental performance of an earthwork project using cleaner production
strategies. Journal of Cleaner Production, 47, pp.368-376.
Ingrao, C., Bacenetti, J., Bezama, A., Blok, V., Geldermann, J., Goglio, P., Koukios, E.G.,
Lindner, M., Nemecek, T., Siracusa, V. and Zabaniotou, A., 2016. Agricultural and forest
biomass for food, materials and energy: bio-economy as the cornerstone to cleaner
production and more sustainable consumption patterns for accelerating the transition towards
equitable, sustainable, post fossil-carbon societies. Journal of Cleaner Production, 117, pp.4-
6.

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Vieira, L.C. and Amaral, F.G., 2016. Barriers and strategies applying Cleaner Production: a
systematic review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 113, pp.5-16.