The world is changing, and so is our society and the dynamics that guide inter-relationships among people, markets and the economy. The general panorama induces us to imagine and put into practice a new way of doing business; a model that while paying attention to production requirements, also knows how to reconcile the common good and the development of the society through the protection of people's health and the environment.
What is needed is collective awareness; starting from each individual until reaching each and every organisation. In such a context, the industry today takes a role of corporate social, economic and environmental responsibility.
Since January 2020 ATB Group has decided to promote a campaign to increase awareness on environmental protection, emission abatement, reduction of pollutant sources, energy saving, and consumption optimization. How? By means of a project that, through simple, day-to-day actions, can transform old, settled habits into good practices to be used every day at the workplace. This is a revolution that moves from bottom to top, taking small steps, which is fundamental for the change.
And that is how ATB Green 2020 was born: a journey whose objective is to create a corporate organisation and production processes that aim to be sustainable from an economic, environmental and social point of view. This project, supported by ATB Group Management, actively involves all the areas of the company, and requires that all workers take part in it. They will be the main promoters of careful behaviour and common sense in the daily activities at the office or the plant.
«In the last few months we wanted to increase awareness on sustainability issues. We asked ourselves how we could contribute to make our company sustainable. And the answer was assuming a strong corporate social, economic and environmental responsibility that guides our choices», explains Luigi Redaelli, Managing Director of the Heavy Equipment Division of the ATB Group. «In order to turn these principles into concrete actions, we created a large-scale work group involving several core businesses of the company in a participatory planning experience, enriched by pooling different points of view». Each team member submitted a proposition to improve internal procedures with a «green» approach. Some of these propositions became actual projects that will be launched the coming weeks.
The first project involves implementing selective waste sorting at ATB headquarters in Roncadelle. The aim is to improve the sorting already being used in the facilities, and to adopt a similar system in the offices. To do so, the latter are now furnished with baskets for paper, plastic and unsorted waste, including bins for used batteries/toner cartridges. In order to understand how important recycling is, we estimated how much plastic we produce at the workstation in one year, how much carbon dioxide we emitted, and how many trees would be needed to absorb that volume. We also calculated that if a person drank 1 litre of water every 8 hours, 5 days a week, during 240 days a year, that would mean two 0.5L bottles a day by 250 workers. The result was 3,000 kg of plastic and18,000kg of CO2. We would need more than 1,200 trees to absorb that, practically a 4,800 m² forest!
Another core asset of ATB Green is to reduce the consumption of plastic, paper, power, and heating. Ad hoc information material is being written; it will be later distributed to all workers in order to raise awareness on consumption optimization at both offices and plants. In addition, tests are conducted to monitor and quantify how much electricity and methane gas- used for welding and plating- is wasted. In the meantime, thorough surveys are conducted to determine a new, advanced and smart approach to use the natural resources. «Such data will be the pillars onto which we will base our accurate guidelines of action», states the manager. As regards the lighting system, we have already shifted from neon to LEDs, which implies several advantages in terms of energy saving and maintenance».
«The road to a sustainable future is built step by step», adds Redaelli. «We have decided to start from small initiatives within a clear strategic framework, that of ATB Manufacturing System. The objective of the ATB Green project is to improve constantly as well as to reinforce the group outlook. A group of people sharing a common goal can achieve the impossible».