Technological information infrastructure for design and operation of recycling systems

It becomes a widely accepted consensus that every human activity has to be designed or redesigned from the viewpoint of the sustainability. In the field of product manufacturing, development and improvement of products and manufacturing processes that reduce environmental impacts become very important issues and their implementation has become a mandatory as a public concern on environmental impacts of manufacturing industries heightened. In order to support those activities for sustainability, an evaluation of environmental impacts (e.g. global warming, ozone layer depletion) of new products and new processes are crucial. This paper proposes an expansion of technological information infrastructure concept and defines process units that are basic building blocks of recycling systems. The proposed scheme is a basis for life cycle engineering and enables a model-based engineering and a PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Action) based management in designs and operation of recycling systems.