Maintenance Quality and Environmental Performance Improvement: An Integrated Approach

Womack

et al.

(1990) coined the term “lean production”. In the lean context, nonvalue- adding activity was viewed as any activity that does not lead directly to creating the product. The approach is based on reducing the non-value-adding activities which results in savings to the company. It has been reported that activities not adding value to the product comprise more than 90% of the total activity (Caulkin, 2002). Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) is an approach which aims at the total elimination of all losses, including breakdowns, equipment set ups, adjustment losses, minor stoppages, reduced speed, defects and rework and all major yield losses. It may be said that the ultimate goal of TPM are few equipment breakdowns and zero product defects resulting in ultimate utilization of production assets and plant capacity. Romm (1994) indicates that environmental benefits are involved in the lean implementation. A strong relationship between lean manufacturing and environmental improvement has been reported (Waldrop, 1999; Pojasek and Five, 1999; Florida, 1996; Hart, 1997). The foregoing suggests that maintenance quality, which essentially has a similar objective to lean manufacturing, has a strong relationship with environmental improvement.