Assessment of End-of-life Strategies for Automation Technology Components

Automation technology components (ATCs) are often used in highly individual applications by manufacturing companies. The large variety of different use scenarios creates high uncertainty concerning most suitable end-of-life strategies. Typical strategies that can be implemented during the products end-of-life stage are reuse, repair, remanufacturing and recycling. As each of these strategies has a different effect on the products economic and environmental performance an assessment method is needed that respects relevant parameters. Most publications illustrate methods for environmental or sustainable product assessment. Much less is known about how end-of-life strategies can be assessed for a product. For this reason, the article discusses a procedure for the assessment of end-of-life strategies with an examplary prototype tool for pneumatic cylinders.