3- The sustainability of a compressed air installation should be evaluated including disposal of the installation after its lifetime
Like all other equipment, manufacturers are seeking lower cost manufacturing methods, in order to be more competitive in sales and make more profit for the company. We see prices of the goods over the last decades being stable or even declining, despite inflation. A high definition OLED television is cheaper today than a black and white television 50 yrs ago ! This is of course nice for customers spenditure.
The downside is the amount of waste produced. As the cost of manufacturing goes down, the lifetime of goods is also shortened. For consumer goods, often the lifetime of usage was short anyhow so goods were being disposed while still operating as new. Shorter lifetime is accepted for certain cases but still on sustainability, it is a crititcal discussion on when justified, as the amount of products being disposed.
In Industrial goods, such as Air Compressors, the same trend occured. Air Compressors are being produced at a continuous lower cost and sales prices have been rather flat (not declining!).
The result of the lower cost manufacturing, is that the lifetime and reliability of air compressors has gone down. Most of the industrial compressors now have a lifetime of 10 yrs and some of the core components, less than 5 yrs.
The disposal of an old compressor and its components represents part of the waste, being generated on a continuous bases. The latest generation of Air Compressors are being equiped with electronics, like frequency converters, of which the lifetime is often shorter than 5 yrs. After 5 years, the electronic components are not available anymore and it is cheaper to replace the whole compressor than repairing the electronics.
Therefor, in approach to Sustainable Compressed Air, the lifetime and the disposal of the Air-Compressor needs to be included into the equation.
VISION AND BELIEVES
3- The sustainability of a compressed air installation should be evaluated including disposal of the installation after its lifetime
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