Environmental sustainability seems to be one of the major issues businesses and governments want to deal with. The very reality of climate change is making us consider and evaluate how we can conduct our businesses in a smart way that doesn’t contribute to this growing problem while padding the bottom line.

For this a lot of manufacturers and companies are retracing their product lifecycle to determine where they are creating a lot of footprint and how to reduce it. The European Commission has also developed a new method for measuring sustainability in products in association with experts called PEF (Product Environmental Footprint). This approach will require recording, storing and analyzing data to apply product environmental footprint across the product life cycle. However, current systems most likely won’t be able to scale the diverse data collection. Cleaning and filtering of data is difficult due to improper format and data entries. A lot of tasks are manually handled which leads to errors and lastly it costs a great deal to conduct these kinds of analyses and getting experts to handle it.

Blockchain tech can be helpful here and help tick off a lot of criteria. It’s a distributed, unchangeable ledger that record data on a shared network and will allow you to track your assets on the same network. All participants in the network get an overview of the process and can only be accessed by them if they have permission to view.

1. To analyze and take into account the current cradle to grave situation of the product manufactured:

The first step to solving a problem is recognizing what the problem is. Is it the raw material required to make the product? Is it the assembling? Who are involved in the entire process? Where are major redundancies and errors occurring? These are some questions to take into account. Running through the entire life cycle data of the product to the point of its disposal after use is essential and blockchain will help accrue that data into meaningful information while giving you the ability to trace back steps in the life cycle process.

2. The collection and storing of data:

If the format of the data, the way it is collected and stored does not have any easy flow, it will be hard for anyone let alone experts to make sense of the data stored. Blockchain will make collection of data easier while making sure the data flow is optimized to meet requirements. It will also make the entire process cost effective to the company.

3. Figuring out a custom life cycle process:
Now that we are armed with important information and have a good idea of the cradle to grave process of a product, we find ways to minimize footprint generated. This can be done by resource planning and management, syncing various data sources and cleaning/ filtering it as required and mapping it to the assessment. If every phase of a life cycle is synced with each other, its easier to understand workflows and make it more efficient and sustainable.

Automation of a lot of manual process will reduce manual errors and third party involvement making the life cycle more optimized. Blockchain gives an end to end view and allows scalability. These attributes help assessing the sustainability of a life cycle and gives us economical measures to apply. MSRvantage will guide companies with their next gen solutions to understanding and assessing product life cycle so that your company brand is synonymous with environmental sustainability and product integrity.