Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
back and forth focused on how to interpret and de
ne the EU's directive banning or lim-
iting the use of certain hazardous substances in each 'homogeneous element'
5
in each
product. Once Motorola decided that the term 'homogeneous element' would be applied
to each distinct element in each distinct part in each Motorola product, Motorola-Penang
brought its EHS personnel, its design engineers, manufacturing engineers and supply
chain managers together to sort through how the subsidiary would organize itself and
how it would interact with its suppliers to meet these requirements. This
ad hoc
group
broke each product down into its constituent 'homogeneous elements' and analyzed each
element to determine whether it met the RoHS Directive. Because some of these homo-
geneous elements were provided to Motorola-Penang by local and/or global suppliers,
Motorola-Penang began asking its suppliers to provide additional detailed documenta-
tion on the use of hazardous materials in the production of the parts they supplied. This
documentation was double checked at Motorola-Penang and at one of Motorola's labs.
But work with suppliers extends beyond requests for information and testing of sup-
plied parts. Increasingly, Motorola-Penang has been working with suppliers on problems
related to increasing the compliance rate of its products with RoHS and WEEE. In one
instance, Motorola-Penang worked with several chemical suppliers, other Motorola sub-
sidiaries and Motorola corporate to develop a new no-clean
fi
ux tin/lead solder paste. A
similar process was used in developing halogen-free printed wiring boards (PWBs) and
fl
fl
ex.
6
In another instance, Motorola-Penang worked closely with its Indian suppliers of
leather cases for hand phones produced by Motorola-Penang to reduce the level of
chromium in these cases. This required working with chemical and leather suppliers to
fi
nd an alternative process for 'softening' the leather cases. As a result, the leather suppli-
ers have been able to reduce the concentration of chromium by 99.99%.
Taken together, Motorola's longstanding program of continuous improvement along
the supply chain, coupled with its extension of this program to an evolving set of
rm-
based environmental standards, helped the company integrate traditional price, quality
and on-time delivery expectations with environmental standards for its suppliers. When
this was combined with growing global pressures to reduce the toxicity and increase the
recyclability of its products, Motorola went a step further by using corporate environ-
mental standards and its own protocols to meet these new external standards and to force
and entice its wholly owned subsidiaries and
fi
fi
rst-tier suppliers to specify the toxicity of
the parts they manufacture.
Conclusions
Our research suggests that globalization has had some signi
ects
in several industries in East Asia where industrial development strategies have been based
on two institutional innovations, the capitalist developmental state and policy integration.
Together these appear to be driving
fi
cant environmental e
ff
rms in this region to upgrade their technological and
environmental capabilities. This has been largely an imitative process by which local
fi
rms
have imported, adopted and adapted newer OECD-derived process technologies, includ-
ing pollution control technologies and clean production processes, in particular indus-
tries. But none of this was automatic and it took time, energy and some failure before
governments
fi
rms
to invest heavily in such technological learning. Because investment in technological
learning is costly, di
fi
gured out how to create the institutional environment that would get
fi
cult and uncertain, governments recognized that they had to provide
