A professor at Harvard Business School is working with US BCSD member Cook Composites and Polymers on a case study of CCP's experiences in by-product synergy.  Deishin Lee, associate professor of business administration at Harvard, writes that "Optimization of a by-product synergy operation requires the firm to shift from a "product and waste" mentality to a "product and product" mentality, and thereby actively manage the quantities of both products to maximize profit."

The World BCSD is preparing a case study on the US BCSD's by-product synergy process as a part of an energy efficiency package to be sent to the International Energy Agency and the G8 Gleneagles Process on Climate Change, Clean Energy and SD.

I will post the case when it is completed.

And Wiley Press is publishing a book in 2008 on industrial sustainability programs that will include a 30-page chapter on our by-product synergy process that addresses the process, results, partners and potential for significant future climate change and energy efficiency reductions.

The Biscuit and Cracker Manufacturers Association's technical meeting this year in Niagra Falls (September) included a session on by-product synergy. Highlights and insights:

• Sustainable development is climbing on the priority lists of bakers and food companies thanks to Wal-Mart's declaration to pursue the idea and to help its vendors pursue the idea. Climate change and energy costs are big contributors as well, helping management pay more attention.
• Projects like by-product synergy allow smaller companies to pool material streams for a critical mass allowing recyclers to establish pick-up runs that are worthwhile to all.
  
• Bringing companies from various sectors together to work on material reuse helps encourage recyclers to be more customer friendly -- like taking materials when prices drop or taking all materials even those they may not want to deal with. In a synergy project, if they don't want it, somebody else likely will. Competition works wonders.
  

The results of the Ohio Waste to Profit (W2P) symposium that was held in Columbus on April 12 are now available at the following site:

http://www.resilience.osu.edu/W2P.html

Included are downloadable copies of the presentations, a brief report on the meeting results, and a news story that appeared in Business First describing the meeting.

We are proceeding to develop a regional byproduct synergy initiative as a partner of the Center for Resilience at Ohio State University.

Thanks to Joseph Fiksel, co-director of the Center for Resilience at Ohio State University, for arranging for the meeting and partnering with the US BCSD on development of the project.

The Puget Sound BPS team is organizing efforts for a Kickoff meeting which will be held on June 28th in Seattle City Hall’s Bertha Landes Room. Team members bring a wealth of experience and resources to the project. Pollution Prevention Resource Center (PPRC) is acting as project manager and has extensive industrial pollution prevention experience. The WA Department of Ecology and King County Local Hazardous Waste Program have expertise in waste exchanges and hazardous waste reduction strategies. Business Council members, Battelle and RETEC will be acting as primary technical consultants for the network members, and the Network for Business Innovation and Sustainability (NBIS) brings a variety of contacts with companies that are striving for environmental excellence.

Staff members from the Portuguese Business Council for Sustainable Development visited the US BCSD recently to learn more details about how to launch a by-product synergy project. Plans call for initiating a BPS project in Lisbon radiating out to other regions sometime in 2007.

The Portuguese BCSD has a membership of more than 60 companies representing most sectors of the country’s economy. Interest in BPS was kindled when the Portuguese BCSDs’ executive director heard of results from the US BCSD and UK National Industrial Symbiosis Program. 

UCLA Anderson Forecast invited US BCSD to submit suggestions for implementing sustainable development in the City of Los Angeles.

The US BCSD submission, which was published by UCLA in April following a community meeting presided over by the Mayor, focused on two inclusive collaborative programs developed by the US BCSD. One is our by-product synergy process, which is helping companies and cities cut emissions and energy use, reduce hazardous and other wastes, and create new revenues. The other is our Green Brownfields process that offers a way of resurrecting disused industrial sites as ecological uplift zones. Find the full report at the following link.

 http://uclaforecast.com/solutions/