Abstract
PurposePoor maintenance management leads to non-negligible economic, environmental and social impacts and obstacles to the sustainable manufacturing paradigm. Studies evaluating maintenance impacts on sustainability underline growing interest in the topic, but reports on the industrial field are lacking. Therefore, this paper investigates the industrial environment and the indicators that manufacturing companies use for measuring their maintenance impacts.Design/methodology/approachIn this pilot survey study, several stakeholders of production enterprises in the south of Italy were interviewed to unveil the spread of the measurement of maintenance impacts on sustainability and the indicators used by those companies.FindingsThe interview results showed a low level of awareness among stakeholders about maintenance impacts on sustainability. Maintenance stakeholders are mainly focused on technical and economic factors, whereas environmental, quality and safety stakeholders are becoming more aware of maintenance impacts on environmental and social factors. However, both groups need guidelines to define sustainability indicators to assess such impacts.Originality/valueThis exploratory study allowed us to investigate the current situation in industrial organisations and achieve the first variegated and diversified vision of the awareness of company stakeholders on maintenance impacts on the sustainability of several business functions. This paper provides a valuable contribution to “maintenance and sustainability” research area in production contexts and sheds light on non-negligible maintenance impacts on sustainability, providing preliminary insights on the topic and an effective basis for defining future research opportunities. Moreover, this study enables increased awareness among internal and external manufacturing company stakeholders on the role of maintenance in sustainable production.
Highlights
Introduction and motivation of the studyManufacturing enterprises have a huge impact on the surrounding environment, society and economy and, on sustainable development (Garetti and Taisch, 2012)
5.2 Results of the path 1 core section of the interview Following the methodology steps, interviewees in this path were asked whether maintenance impacts were managed or measured using indicators
We focus on the four stakeholders (C, D, L and N) that did not measure maintenance impacts, investigating the different ways they managed maintenance impacts, as well as the obstacles and limits preventing the use of indicators
Summary
Introduction and motivation of the studyManufacturing enterprises have a huge impact on the surrounding environment, society and economy and, on sustainable development (Garetti and Taisch, 2012). The sustainable manufacturing paradigm has attracted a great deal of interest in the last years as an approach that aims to empower companies to cope with several challenges, such as the depletion of physical resources, customer requests for higher product quality and stricter laws and regulations (Eslami et al, 2018). Given its impact on other company processes, the maintenance process has great potential in terms of the pursuit of sustainable manufacturing; as such, it is becoming an increasingly important business function (Franciosi et al, 2017, 2018; Iung and Levrat, 2014). Maintenance impacts the technical conditions of assets and equipment (reliability and availability performance) and sustainability issues (safety performance, environmental damage, high energy and resource consumption, etc.). Maintenance affects sustainability in various ways, including direct impacts due to the execution of maintenance activities and indirect impacts on the assets and equipment to be maintained and manufactured products due to maintenance efficiency/inefficiency
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