Honda Resource Circularity Center Gives Retired Equipment a Second Life
The objective of resource circulation is to keep our products in service as long as we possibly can at their highest possible value and then recover them at their end of life. This center really expands upon our previous resource circulation activities as a company by focusing on the full complete life cycle of an indirect good. How can we take end of life products and equipment and get that either sold to an external buyer or recycle that for value? So take for example these robots that you see behind me. These were installed at the Mary’sville auto plant within the weld department to manufacture our vehicles. Once they reach their end of life through new model activity, we have to retire those assets. They’re still functionally usable. So instead of getting rid of them, what we want to do is bring them back to the center, remove the unique characteristics that made it a weld robot for Honda, strip it down to be a base unit, and then look to sell that either externally or if we can ideally find a home for it within the Honda network. Finding a buyer for items that may have been discarded before gives me a sense of accomplishment and joy knowing that we’re repurposing and giving new life to these items. One of the key aspects of making this a worthwhile venture for the company is to reduce the cost or even make it profitable, localize as much of this circularity activity as we can. So, we see multiple centers like this one in Ohio being replicated across North America. By focusing on the full complete life cycle of an indirect good, we’re transforming the way that we think about waste, not as an end, but as a resource. So the aluminum, the steel that we produce here from tearing down an industrial motor or a robot, we put that back into the supply chain so we can reduce that demand on virgin raw materials. Everything we do here helps us become a more responsible and resilient organization. [Music]
The Honda Resource Circularity Center in Ohio is turning yesterday’s equipment into tomorrow’s resources. Going beyond traditional manufacturing recycling programs that focus exclusively on harvesting scrap metal value, this first-of-its-kind center in the auto industry extends the lifecycle of tools, equipment and electronics used in Honda operations that would otherwise end up in landfills.
It’s a major step toward building a circular economy business model that recaptures material value and reduces waste at every turn.
