The Role of Maintenance Towards Circular Economy

Abstract

The manufacturing industry is a major contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, yet it also holds vast potential for sustainability transitions. As circular economy (CE) principles gain traction, integrating them into established industrial frameworks presents a persistent challenge especially within Company-Specific Production Systems (XPS) and its core pillars such as Professional Maintenance (PM) which are traditionally cost-driven and exclude social and environmental perspectives of sustainability. This thesis investigates how PM can evolve into a strategic enabler of sustainability by embedding CE indicators. Initially, a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) was conducted which identified 23 CE indicators at the micro and nano levels of manufacturing as well as common barriers and enablers to their deployment. These indicators were assessed for their measurability, data requirements, and strategic fit within PM through a structured questionnaire and semi-structured interviews with professionals across a Swedish manufacturing company. The results showed that operational data was widely adopted at the sites, while energy, environmental and material data was significantly less adopted and more challenging for PM. Based on these insights, a parallel framework was developed that aligns the CE indicators with the existing PM maturity model. Together they capture both cost-efficiency and CE, by mapping indicators to maturity levels where data availability and implementation feasibility converge. Having created the framework, key deployment considerations were identified in the literature and case study and then mapped against the appropriate levels in the framework. The study shows how management support and cultural readiness is important to consider initially, while more external perspectives, such as Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting and supply chain collaborations are crucial towards higher maturity levels. This thesis identifies CE Indicators suitable for PM, creates a CE-integrated maturity model and identifies deployment considerations. By doing so it provides an academically based, yet grounded in industry, way of integrating the CE perspective into PM.