Life Cycle Management. En forankring af livscyklusorienteret miljøbeskyttelse i virksomhedernes strategiske arbejde

摘要

There is a growing consensus from both environmental authorities and an increasingnumber of consumers, about the inappropriateness of focusing solely upon theenvironmental burdens that emerge from the manufacturing phase of a product. Instead, itis the environmental burdens that stem from a product's lifecycle, beginning with resourceextraction and continuing through manufacturing and consumption to disposal, that aremoving more and more into the spotlight. In relation to this, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)is a tool that is used to identify where in the products life cycle environmental burdensarise.LCA's are, however, known for being both resource demanding and difficult to carry out.As a result, only a limited number of firms have carried out LCA's in Denmark, and theseare usually characterised as having an add-on function, rather than being an integrated partof the firms everyday activities. The objective of this master thesis is therefore, to developa management concept that can be used to anchor life cycle oriented environmentalprotection in a firm. This concept, which is in the early phase of development, is calledLife Cycle Management and builds upon three elements - Strategy, LCA andImplementation.The developed Life Cycle Management concept builds upon the assertion that a firmsstrategic work - the decisions that are continually made in a firm and the work that thesedecisions are based upon - is the key to the anchoring of life cycle oriented environmentalprotection in a firm. This assertion is supported by two arguments that build primarilyupon a theoretical fundament.Firstly, it is argued that the formulation of a firm's strategy is a dynamic process, that iscontinually tailored, via its strategic work, to changes in the firm's surroundings. A firmthat is flexible and able to adjust its strategic direction according to the changing demandsand wishes of customers, authorities, etc. is therefore likely to maintain a competitiveadvantage. An integration of life cycle oriented environmental protection into the firm'sstrategic work, will therefore be attractive for firms because it can contribute to themaintenance of their competitive ability, both in the short and long term, via apreparedness for new environmental demands and wishes.Secondly, it is argued that an integration of life cycle oriented environmental protection ina firm's strategic work, will ensure that the scope of the LCA is restricted to only thoseaspects that have strategic relevance. In this way, the LCA is both less comprehensive and resource demanding and therefore suited to supporting a firm's decisions, which aretypically made within a limited timeframe.In order to support a firm's lifecycle oriented environmental work, it is stated that there is aneed to draw up specific guidelines regarding how a firm can both integrate a LCA in itsstrategic work and carry the LCA out. Based on the analysis of current LCA methods,together with interviews with the environmental managers from Brdr. Hartmann, SophusBerendsen and Novotex - Danish companies that to a greater or lesser extent incorporatelife cycle environmental protection in their activities - a simple and operational LC A-guideis developed, with the central objective of aiding companies in their initial LCA work. TheLC A-guide is called focus-LC A-guide because the LCA is focusing on the firm's strategicwork. The developed focus-LC A-guide is subsequently tried out on one of the products ofthe case firm, and experience from this is used to revise the guide.In order to ensure that the work associated with the LCA is successfully implemented, it isargued that there is a need to support the integration and carrying out of the LCA, througha building up of environmental competence both within the firm and in the product chain.Using both theory and the empirical work at the case firm and the interviewed companies,together with early experience with LCM, a series of examples of both internalcompetencies, in the form of tools, procedures and training, and external competencies, inthe form of co-operation with firms in the product chain, are presented.It is the authors' conviction that LCM is a concept, that can contribute to the spreading oflifecycle oriented environmental protection in firms. It is recognised, however, that animportant prerequisite for this is that the focus-LCA is tailored to the actual decision that isto be made. There is, therefore, a need for close co-operation between the environmentalworker and the firm's decisionmakers. In addition, it is emphasised that the thesis is onlyintended as an introduction to discussion, and as such should be developed further.