Environmental protection in industry is becoming increasingly important in view of the negative consequences of climate change. The article reveals what sustainability in production means, how environmental policy deals with it and what measures companies can take to actively tackle environmental protection.
The way we do business today is extremely resource-intensive and contributes in many ways to the destruction of the natural foundations of life. The most prominent examples of the damaging consequences of climate change in industry are the overfishing of the world’s oceans and the large-scale deforestation of the world’s forests. The consequences of climate change are also increasingly reflected in extreme weather phenomena and the loss of biodiversity.
As the world’s population grows, the demand for goods and services increases from year to year. And indeed, a modern society with a level of prosperity like Germany’s is inconceivable without the use of natural resources. The problem is that raw materials such as oil, natural gas, ores, water and soil are not available in unlimited quantities. Natural resources are finite – and ecosystems and the atmosphere cannot absorb carbon dioxide and the other pollutants we cause indefinitely either.
Managing the scarce resources available to us is one of the central challenges of the modern economy. Experts predict that the consequential costs of climate change will amount to around 25 percent of the world’s gross national product by 2050. For this reason alone, we need a transition to a "green economy" – in other words, an economic approach that combines economy and ecology and contributes to the preservation of nature and the environment.
Environmental protection in industry is a new guard rail for future economic development. In this context, the Green Economy requires the ecological transformation of the entire economy. Environmental protection in industry is about reducing the consumption of natural resources, cutting emissions and transforming value chains.
The task of promoting sustainable development lies with large industrial companies as well as small and medium-sized enterprises. In view of the fact that natural resources are limited, but demand for goods and services is rising worldwide, it is essential to decouple economic growth and the consumption of natural resources.
However, this can only succeed in the long term if environmental innovations and efficiency technologies are developed and implemented. For example, the use of catalytic converters alone has made a significant contribution to environmental protection in industry and – in conjunction with higher fuel qualities and modern engines – has reduced harmful emissions by more than 90 percent.
The opportunities for advancing the topic of environmental protection in industry are particularly promising in the area of the so-called green future markets.
These are as follows.
A sustainable industry can only succeed if both private individuals and the economy switch to emission-free mobility. It is therefore the task of the vehicle industry to develop appropriate innovations and bring them to market.
Promoting the expansion of the charging station infrastructure also plays an important role in the switch to electromobility. To ensure the sustainability of e-cars, it is also important to improve the production and disposal of batteries in environmental and social terms.
In parallel, companies are called upon to promote the use of climate-friendly fuels and the development of climate-neutral concepts for propulsion technologies in maritime transport as well as in aviation.
One technology that plays a key role in achieving climate and sustainability goals is lightweight construction. For example, modern lightweight construction technologies have aim to minimize transport and manufacturing costs and thus achieve energy and resource efficiency.
On the one hand, this involves reducing the weight of vehicles and aircraft, on the other hand it involves reducing the quantities of materials consumed in the production of goods of all kinds. Lightweight design concepts and materials not only enable climate-friendly production, but also offer the opportunity to reduce the energy required for vehicle operation and cut emissions and resource consumption.
Automation technology can also contribute to nature conservation and environmental protection in Industry 4.0. Artificial intelligence and robotics, for example, have long been contributing to the beginnings of a sustainable circular economy. For example, there are already robots that can be used to sort waste and help improve the recycling rate.
Furthermore, automation can promote nature conservation by allowing new machines to be tested in advance by means of virtual commissioning, thus – due to their longevity – requiring as few industrial spare parts as possible.
Nowadays, the issue of environmental protection is enshrined in the constitutions of most countries as an important task of state policy. In Germany, for example, the Basic Law (Article 20a GG) stipulates that the state must pay attention to environmental protection. In Germany, the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety and the Federal Environmental Agency are responsible for environmental protection in industry.
The European Union has also played an important role in Germany’s environmental policy for several years. For example, the member states must take the requirements of sustainable development into account when defining Community policies.
However, it is not only the state that bears responsibility for sustainable development, but also industry. Thanks to the fact that public interest in the impact of business activities on the environment is increasing, so is the interest of companies in fulfilling their social responsibility in this area.
For this reason, sustainable management has become a real buzzword and has been declared a strategic corporate objective by many companies, especially large ones. In this way, measures for environmental protection in industry can be combined with cost-cutting targets and image enhancement.
In many cases, companies now publicly document their commitment to climate and environmental protection. For example, many companies that strive to protect nature publish regular sustainability reports that serve to inform their investors, business partners and end customers. In addition, companies are required by law to report on the impact of their actions on the environment and the environmental protection measures they have taken as part of their financial reporting.
Business and the environment are closely linked, which makes the issue of environmental protection in industry all the more important. Without natural resources, Western societies could never have achieved the level of prosperity we enjoy today. However, it is becoming increasingly apparent that our current way of doing business is undermining general prosperity and that of future generations because it is destroying the natural foundations of life. For this reason, the transformation to a Green Economy that reconciles value creation and the environment is essential.
