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Most automotive businesses still use a linear mode of operation: they order raw materials, manufacture products, send them to customers, and dispose of waste. However, there is a more efficient and sustainable way to save on automotive manufacturing waste (of all types): participating in the circular economy.

In a circular economy, organisations design waste out of the supply chain. By doing so, they save costs, win business, and boost employee and brand engagement. What’s more, the circular economy can help the automotive industry reduce its carbon emissions by 75% by 2030.

Here’s why businesses from automotive manufacturers to automotive stores are considering a switch to the circular economy and why your current waste management practices offer a simple place to start the transition.

Why the Automotive Industry is Embracing the Circular Economy

The automotive industry has remained at the forefront of innovation for a century. From Henry Ford’s assembly line to Toyota’s Just in Time (JIT) manufacturing, the industry has initiated trends and set standards from manufacturing to distribution. Now, the automotive industry is working with the World Economic Forum and McKinsey and Co on the private/public Circular Cars Initiative (CCI). The CCI will offer roadmaps for the industry to create ‘circular cars,’ examples of which include End-of-Life directives for vehicles, regulating batteries for sustainability, and pushing for urban mobility transitions.

Car manufacturers are already on board. In 2021, The BMW Group launched the RE:BMW Circular Lab. The UK’s Jaguar Land Rover also takes the circular economy seriously, with the aim of achieving net zero carbon status across all products by 2039.

Why are automotive industry leaders on board? One study found that a circular economy can not only reduce emissions but boost Europe’s resource productivity by 3% by 2030, saving €600 billion a year in costs and €1.8 trillion in other benefits.

Get Started by Separating Waste Streams

The CCI will transform automotive production and will upend existing modes of operating straight down the supply chain. However, it is possible to start engaging in the circular economy as your organisation makes those plans.

Recycling waste management is an excellent way to initiate the transition into a circular economy. With the help of recycling balers, it’s easy to not only give cardboard, plastic, and glass waste a new life but even generate new revenue.

A tyre baler can immediately help automotive businesses address sustainability concerns and participate in the circular economy. Old tyre recycling allows for recycled tyres to be broken down into fibres, wire, alternative fuels, and granules and then manufactured back into rubber compounds for all kinds of uses, from tyre design to base materials for play safety surfaces, artificial grass pitches, running tracks, and equestrian arenas.

LSM offers waste management solutions that make it simple to scale and streamline your waste management and recycling program. With recycling balers for the automotive industry, LSM offers flexible baler rentals, which makes it easy to match trends in stock or production capacity.

Go Further by Reviewing Your Business’s Supply Chain

The automotive industry by-and-large follows Toyota’s Just In Time manufacturing strategy. While some industry insiders wonder whether JIT will survive the next decade, it’s important to look at JIT not just as reducing raw materials or stock as a means for reducing waste, but ensuring that orders show up where they’re needed.

To achieve this, you need to review your supply chain and look for inefficiencies. When you optimise your supply chain, you not only reduce the waste of raw materials but also reduce emissions and recycling waste by extension because fewer goods travel fewer miles. These early-stage changes help prepare your company to embrace bigger changes later.

The Circular Economy is Waiting

As the entire automotive industry prepares for a once-in-a-generation change, it’s important to remember that it’s possible to begin preparing for those changes now. Something as simple as renting a tyre baler machine can help prepare automotive stores and automotive facilities’ mindsets for reducing or eliminating waste in even more radical and sustainable ways down-the-road.