The Common Thread Between Deodorant and Soda

This exercise serves to illustrate the concept of Cross Industry Parts Interchange and provides some opportunist with a patentable idea.

Upon comparison, it was noted that the soda cap (following opening and removing), was the same diameter and nearly the same height as that portion of a deodorant package that the user turns to dispense the product. Further research indicates that the soda cap and deodorant package are both molded from the same material, and are nearly the same weight. This qualifies the soda cap as a possible fit to redirect to the deodorant package.

Further, the possibility of a take-back for the soda cap by the company was considered, but there is the round ring that seals the cap to the bottle -- the seal is broken upon opening and remains around the bottle. The questions that must be answered: Would it be cheaper and cause less environmental impact to recycle it? Could it be taken back and reused at less or the same expense?

Rightfully so, production costs and processes are proprietary and confidential, so a simple comparison was performed with the data that was received:

Parts Interchange Example:

Class: Packaging to packaging

Subclass:  Food to non-food

First generation part: 2-Liter or 20 oz soda bottle cap

Second Generation use:  Twist piece at base of non-roll-on deodorant package

Modification Necessary for exchange:  Slight, if any

New Intellectual Property:  Method for attaching screw rod to soda bottle cap

Parts Comparison, 1 Million Pieces:　
 

	Substance	Size/Shape Comparison	Weight	CO2 Emission	Percent of Useful Part
Soda Cap	Polypropylene	Round, Diameter: 2.8 cm Height: 1.1 cm	3.1 Grams	5270 kg	100%
Deodorant Twister	Polypropylene	Round, Diameter: 2.8 cm Height: .9 cm	3.7 Grams (including screw rod)	6290 kg	Approx. 90%

　
In this example the part-yielding manufacturer would have no action to take whatsoever. The company accepting the part would then have to consider if organizing a redirect of the part to include in the production of the screw rod (which is attached to the twistable part) would benefit them in terms of environmental impact, as well as costs, both areas of which would have to be considered for:

• Getting the parts to the manufacturer -- a simple drop off bin for soda caps could be arranged at grocery stores or perhaps sporting events. Then there is the pick-up and transport -- the ailing U.S. Postal Service could benefit from regular pick-ups such as this. The indirect carbon emissions of the transport would have to be factored in as well.
• Attaching the screw rod to the soda cap, to then serve as the twistable, exposed portion of the deodorant package.
• Modification -- The difference in height is slight but may be prohibitive if not addressed. Either the portion of the deodorant package that accepts the screw rod would need to be stretched to compensate, or the soda cap manufacturer could slightly lower the height of the cap.

With the production methods and costs associated with the current scenario, the deodorant package manufacturer could easily determine if the costs of the change in process would indeed be effective enough to implement, and if they do, the elimination of that portion of their carbon footprint is apparent.

A third-party facilitator could easily be employed to confidentially coordinate with both parties, do the necessary analysis, and assist in implementing the change.

That is the commonality between deodorant and soda -- one part of the packaging. Who will try it first?

A Proposal for Manufacturers in a Green Economy

Introduction

The 50% Doctrine: For any individual part that is used in one application that, once its useful life therein is exhausted, can then be transferred to another application and function appropriately therein, the resources necessary to produce said part are reduced by fifty percent.

In other words, the redirection of any part in a durable or non-durable manufactured good of a particular weight, from its useful life in an initial, or first generation application, to another application, or second generation application, that would have otherwise required the production of another, identical part of the same weight and dimensions, reduces the total weight, production waste, emissions and post-life discards by half. The first and second generation applications can be entirely different from one another.

Parts can include packaging, design, or mechanically functional pieces, and can be redirected thusly:

• Packaging to packaging
• Packaging to design
• Packaging to function (function referring to a movable part that together with assemblage of other parts work together to perform tasks)
• Design to packaging
• Design to design
• Design to function
• Function to function
• Function to packaging
• Function to design

This is the basis of Cross Industrial Parts Interchange (CIPI). There must be trillions of preexisting, utilized parts, the fruits of the last 100+ years of production that could be utilized in this manner; a streamlined method for implementing CIPI involves examining and identifying manufactured parts with the following qualifying elements:

1. The part has functional purpose in an existing application (the first generation).
2. The part is similar enough to a part in another application (the targeted second generation) such that it can be modified to:
   1. function in the second application with some alteration to the part in the initial application, without affecting its performance in the initial application, so that it can function seamlessly in the second application, or
   2. function in the second application as is with some change to the apparati accepting the part in second application, or
   3. will function in the second application with some change to the part in the initial application and changes to the apparati accepting the part in the second application.

Wear and tear and normal abuse would have to be considered both in terms of useful life and safety in a logical succession of parts interchange - a mechanized part that has been tested to have a certain life in, for example, an airplane engine, would be a candidate for a packaging or design part thereafter, and certainly not the reverse. On the other hand, a packaging part from a toner cartridge that is normally discarded and not included in the recycling of the rest of the toner cartridge may very well function safely as a plastic part of one of the seats inside the very same airplane.

Implementation

A large company that manufactures a variety of products with parts and packaging facilities under one roof would most likely be the first and easiest environment for implementation, where a company with geographically distant facilities would be faced with transport. And that would certainly be the case in the event of the ultimate goal of CIPI - across industries, which translates into a collaboration of multiple companies. But as seen with some of the take-back systems for glass bottles, which still include consumer incentives for return, as well as the take back of many forms of toner ink toner cartridges, cell phones, and batteries, redirection is certainly not out of reach.

Could it be the Future?

Here is where the economic issues of and profit and loss can be considered, to a company's, or network of companies' benefit. I foresee the day when different companies from the same or multiple and very diverse product lines sit down together to map out their flow of parts usage. And it would greatly enhance implementation of the spreading use of Extended Producer Responsibility concepts.

There should be great benefits to any thought on this matter as it not only could help save our eroding environment's natural resources and sustainability, but provide a new level of savings and means of creating financial resources. It could eliminate production redundancies and waste outputs that may not have been originally perceived. There could be a boom in new intellectual property rights along the way, and a whole new set of services and jobs. Such an endeavor as this would never hinder the creation of capital, and actually might lead to its explosion in an ever growing greener economy.