Stellantis executive touts savings from reuse

Much of the focus in cutting the climate impact from cars, trucks and SUVs has been on tailpipe emissions.

Kevin Dunbar is focused in other areas.

Dunbar is the director of facilities for Stellantis in North America, and he has been watching the production side of things, in particular, the materials used to ship parts. The company counts 27 manufacturing facilities, including three idled locations, in North America.

At Toledo Assembly Plant, where the Jeep Gladiator and Wrangler are built, company officials noticed lots of waste in the packaging that was used to ship vehicle control parts, namely cardboard partitions.

“We realized we could reuse those partitions going forward,” Dunbar told the Free Press during a recent discussion on the topic.

Dunbar, 42, said the company, which also owns the Ram, Chrysler, Dodge and Fiat brands, worked with the parts supplier and determined the partitions could be reused up to 10 times.

“Not only did we reuse the cardboard and eventually recycle, but also saved money in doing so, almost $250,000,” said Dunbar, who has been with the company for almost eight years and lives in Grosse Pointe Woods. He was born in Dearborn.

More:How a simple box design is saving the auto industry millions of dollars: 'It's amazing'

A similar effort at Warren Truck Assembly, where the Jeep Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer are built, led company officials to determine that cardboard boxes could be reused up to four times, a savings pegged at $127,000, he said.

Material reuse has its limits in terms of maintaining quality, Dunbar said, but extending the life of packaging materials through both reuse and recycling does reduce what ultimately heads to landfills, furthering the company’s goals connected to its Dare Forward 2030 business plan. The company intends to get to net zero carbon emissions by 2038, Dunbar said, noting that everything “marches to our Dare Forward targets.

“In terms of waste and recycling, we like to look at it from what we call ... the waste hierarchy in terms of elimination, complete elimination of the waste from the get-go. Then we look at reuse possibilities and we look at recycling at the end,” Dunbar said. “It’s been a gradual step in terms of the recycling. Really, it started with looking very closely at foam packaging, and now we’ve stepped in further into plastics and cardboard.”

More:State regulators fine Stellantis, require changes at Jefferson North plant over pollution

The Detroit Zoo made headlines years ago by announcing it would no longer sell bottled water, and the Free Press asked Dunbar about this type of approach for reducing waste as well. He said that was something considered for the company’s CTC complex in Auburn Hills, but it was essentially put on pause during the pandemic.

That approach, however, can still offer possibilities.

“It may not necessarily be what’s being sold at the plant in a market or something but more so looking at pallets … and can this pallet be reused? We’ve done that a lot at our Mopar sites,” he said. “I think taking that extra step really … is important to reducing (waste) overall. Again, it comes back to elimination, catching it from the get-go, so when we bring in a new part or a new supplier, carefully examining what kind of footprint they’re leaving behind.”

More:Stellantis, DTE announce 2nd-largest clean power deal of its kind in U.S.

Here are a few data points the company provided about its Reuse Program:

• Avoided sending more than 1,360 cubic meters of packing materials, which would fill 82 parking spots, to local landfills.
• Saved more than $375,000.
• In 2023, saved 35 tons of cardboard from landfills through improved segregation, the equivalent of saving nearly 600 trees.

Contact Eric D. Lawrence: elawrence@freepress.com. Become a subscriber. Submit a letter to the editor at freep.com/letters.