Back in 2008, GM said that it had set itself a high eco target, announcing that it will convert 50 percent of its major global factories into landfill free operations by the end of 2010. To date, the company has reached an 87 percent of completion for this goal.
“We’ve been working for quite some time at eliminating waste and developing support systems to recycle or reuse wastes we can’t yet eliminate,” said Mike Robinson, GM vice president of Environment, Energy and Safety policy. “These plants have taken this process to its highest level. They are leading General Motors and the worldwide manufacturing industry.”
GM’s ladfill-free sites include 27 facilities in North America, 21 sites in Asia-Pacific and Latin America and 14 factories in Europe. On average, over 97 percent of waste materials resulted from GM’s eco-friendly sites are recycled or reused and about 3 percent is converted to energy through the use of waste-to-energy facilities, where they replace fossil fuels.
“Reducing the impact of our manufacturing facilities is an important component of our efforts to remove the automobile from the environmental equation,” Robinson added. “We are actively pursuing ways to improve fuel economy, reduce oil consumption and reduce the CO2 emissions of our vehicles. Our work, however, goes beyond our vehicles to improving the environmental performance of our operations, too.”
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