scope:

Purpose and scope of the guideline

With the approval of the Standards for environmental management systems (ISO 14001 and EMAS) and the enactment of the new German Life-Cycle Management and Waste Act (Kreislaufwirtschafts- und Abfallgesetz, KrW-/AbfG), purchasing has been taken into account in so far as the purchase of reusable or recyclable materials, parts, and components takes a key position in the closing of life-cycle management systems (surpassing Company borders). To date, however, this influence has been mainly limited to the so-called direct materials which enter products without significant transformation processes. In contrast, no comparable attention has yet been paid to the indirect materials, i.e. those objects to be purchased which have no direct relation to the end products. This generally applies in terms of technology and economy, which often manifests itself in the lack of design specifications or the refraining from cost-benefit analyses, and is emphasised by such wordings as "nonproductive material". Especially from the ecological viewpoint, a systematic representation of the use of such indirect materials in the plant is often missing although this would be an important prerequisite to statements regarding the associated environmental effects. Against this background, the present Guideline focuses on the ecology-minded purchasing of indirect materials.

As a matter of principle, this Guideline starts from a broad interpretation of the term of ecology-mindedness. Accordingly, following the idea of ecological life-cycle phases,

• the consumption of natural resources and raw materials,
• energy consumption,
• the effects on waste volume, water and air pollution, and
• general effects on the ecosystem

shall be represented, if possible. Due to this principally broad Interpretation, it is only to a limited extent that particular attention can be paid to special environmental- protection regulations, such as the Life- Cycle Management and Waste Act, or environmental- protection measures from different fields of environmental media, e.g. the neat sorting of materials as a waste management measure. Furthermore, it is to be stressed that while focusing on the target of environmental protection, other technological or economic criteria for the purchasing of indirect materials shall not be neglected, if possible. On the contrary, a data sheet focusing on ecological matters allows to determine possible target conflicts and to exploit any scope of actions in favour of reducing the environmental effects when using indirect materials in a plant.