This presentation provides an introduction to the key concepts of the sustainable supply chain, providing definitions of sustainability, explaining climate change and the ways that supply chains can be expected to change in the future, as a result of the need to "go green". Green design principles are introduced, including the need to avoid creating a "monstrous hybrid". The limitations of recycling are explained and the need for business models centred upon reuse is made clear. The presentation is designed for use at HE5 and HE6 (UK second year or final year Bachelors degree) but it could also be of interest to companies and individuals. The slides are downloadable, and the download includes presenter notes – plus a short sustainability game that was used in class.

1. Dr Richard Farr
The Sustainable Supply Chain

2. The Sustainable Supply Chain:
Learning Outcomes
Understand how business operations have an effect upon
communities, workers and natural systems.
Identify some of the major threats facing supply chains
(and people) in the 21st century.
Discover why recycling isn’t the answer.
See how creative solutions can improve the competitive
performance of a business while also addressing the
‘green’ agenda.
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3. The Sustainable Supply Chain:
Contents
What is Sustainability?
Deep Greens, Pale Greens and Greys
“Being Green” – a short sustainability game
What are the major challenges?
How green is a ripe banana?
Why recycling isn’t working
Meet (and defeat) the Monstrous Hybrid
What to do next
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4. What does “sustainable” mean to you?

5. What is Sustainability?
“Meeting the needs of the
present without
compromising the ability of
future generations to meet
their own needs”
– Report of the World
Council on Economic
Development, 1987
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6. What is Sustainability?
Elkington’s (1994) accounting framework, called the Triple
Bottom Line goes beyond the traditional measures of profit,
return on investment and shareholder value to include
environmental and social dimensions.
Sustainable 6

7. Tree-hugging
is not necessary
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13. A little more than a
century ago, in Australia…
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14. Carbon Footprint
Carbon dioxide is just one ‘greenhouse gas’, but it
provides a useful basis for comparison: CO2e
Everything in the supply chain has carbon consequences:
sourcing of raw materials, processing, manufacture,
transportation, the use phase, and the eventual end-of-
life.
Manufacturing Transportation Product use Recycling Facilities
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15. Carbon Footprint Example
Svanes and Aronsson (2013) showed that the carbon
footprint of bananas is 1.37 kg CO2 per kilogram banana.
Fertiliser, transport, refrigeration, ripening, waste
treatment… everything was considered,
up to the point of retail.
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16. Finally, some progress…
the Paris Agreement
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change aims to hold the increase in global average
temperatures to “well below 2 °C above pre-industrial
levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature
increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels, recognising
that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts
of climate change”
193 UNFCCC countries have signed the treaty.
“Making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards
low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient
development.”
What does this mean for supply chains?
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17. Impact of the Paris Agreement
Canada’s federal government has agreed to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions to 30% below 2005 levels.
The Canadian Prime Minister has proposed a price on
CO2 emissions of $10 per tonne in 2018, rising $10 per
year until it reaches $50 per tonne in 2022.
How much carbon is involved?
Effect upon the supply chain includes:
Inbound transportation
Inventory
Occupancy costs in the warehouse
Outbound transportation/distribution 17

18. Sustainable Motivations
Even if you don’t want to do anything about unfair social
or environmental issues, somebody further along in the
supply chain might insist.
Some businesses won’t consider a supplier if they haven’t
done a ‘carbon audit’.
Is your company still paying for things
that get poured away, or sent up the
chimney?
Can you make ‘green’ performance
profitable?
Companies that do ‘green’ things can
use them in marketing activity.

20. Heat scrap steel to its
melting point, at 1370°C
To do this, most foundries
use 500 to 800 KWh of
energy per tonne
Using grid electricity, at
0.4453 kg CO2e per KWh
(DEFRA, 2012)
Which means 223 – 356 kg
CO2e emitted to melt a
tonne of steel
Additional energy usage to
shape the material into a
new, useful product
Recycling Steel…

21. Component Reuse

22. Can you promote reuse?
Reuse is better than recycling.
Try to specify and order
products that have an ‘extra
life’ when their first use ends.

25. Organic
“nutrients”
Technical
“nutrients”

26. Most disposable
cups are hybrids

27. Imagine…
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28. Social
Environmental
Economic
Sustainable
Lasting Solutions Address
the Triple Bottom Line
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29. Concluding Remarks
What you spend money on
determines how ‘green’ you are
– not just as a citizen, but as a
business, or a whole supply
chain.
The problems are already here,
today – but with honesty and
creativity they can be tackled.
Perhaps the ‘Operating Manual
for Spaceship Earth’ is still being
written – and the next chapter is
yours.
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30. Thank you
and best wishes
Want more?
Further material from Richard Farr on
Capacify, the Sustainable Supply Chain
blog
http://capacify.wordpress.com
On Twitter: @Capacified
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31. References
Anon (1912) Coal Consumption Affecting Climate,
Braidwood Dispatch and Mining Journal, Wednesday 17
July 1912, page 4
Berners-Lee, M. (2010) How Bad are Bananas?: The
Carbon Footprint of Everything, London: Profile Books
DEFRA (2012) Greenhouse Gas Conversion Factors for
Company Reporting, available from:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/2012-
greenhouse-gas-conversion-factors-for-company-
reporting
Elkington, J. (1994), Towards the sustainable corporation:
win-win-win business strategies for sustainable
development, California Management Review, Vol. 36 #231

32. References (continued)
Fuller, R.B. (2008) Operating Manual for Spaceship
Earth, Baden: Lars Muller Publishers
McDonough, W. and Braungart, M. (2009) Cradle to
cradle: remaking the way we make things, London:
Vintage
Svanes, E. and Aronsson, A.K.S. (2013) Carbon footprint
of a Cavendish banana supply chain, International
Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 18, pp. 1450–1464
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33. Up next: people, planet, profit:
a short sustainability game

34. A Short Game:
People, Planet, Profit
The class represent the management of a clothing retail
business.
Four scenarios will be presented, and you must decide
what to do in each case.
You will earn (and lose) points in three categories:
people, planet and profit.

35. Positive Negative
PeoplePlanetProfit