Net positive manufacturing: A restoring, self-healing and regenerative approach to future industrial development

Abstract In today’s consumer driven society, manufacturers can exert unparalleled environmental, economic and societal influence, either for good or bad. The recent uncontrolled industrial growth within both developed and developing countries has resulted in significant damage to the environment in an attempt to sustain economic growth at any cost. In response, global sustainability initiatives, due to inherent and inevitable economic barriers, have often adopted a ‘Less Bad’ approach, which is based on meeting the demands of regional and national legislation and incremental efficiency measures. The benefits of such initiatives are now perceived as too small and too slow to tackle the needs of tomorrow. In this context, when ‘Less Bad is Not Good Enough!’ , what should our aspirations and goals be beyond the scope of current sustainability strategies, methods, tools and technologies ? At the heart of the proposed paradigm shift through ‘Net Positive Manufacturing’ is the ability of manufacturing businesses to adopt a restoring, self-healing, and regenerative approach and simply to put back more into society and the environment than what they take out. This radically novel vision for future industrial development presents a number of methodical, organisational, technological, as well as social and ethical research challenges which are explored in this paper.