Circularity Circularity approach

Target: 80 percent of ABB products and solutions are covered by our circularity approach

ABB circularity approach
ABB circularity approach
ABB circularity approach (graphic)

Our comprehensive circularity approach is built around a framework that drives circularity in our own operations and enables our customers to become more circular. By 2030, we aim to innovate towards new circular business models, covering all stages of the product lifecycle:

  • We consider the entire product lifecycle at the design and sourcing stage. Our goal is to develop products and solutions that can be produced in a resource-efficient manner that minimizes the use of virgin or hazardous materials. At the same time, we ensure that our product design takes various aspects of circularity into account, such as extended lifetime, repairability, modularity and recyclability, among others.
  • In the production phase, we work to eliminate or recycle any waste generated by our processes and packaging.
  • Once our products are in service, we help our customers maximize the efficiency and lifetime of their equipment.
  • At the end of the product lifecycle, we seek to ensure that products can be refurbished whenever possible, or dismantled and recycled. Steel, aluminum, copper and plastics make up the majority of materials used in our products. Most of these materials are reclaimable at the end of a product’s life, and we design our products with this in mind. 

Examples of how we cover the four stages of the circularity approach at ABB

Product design and sourcing

In order to make our product design and sourcing processes more circular, in 2021, we continued to implement a series of projects intended to identify fully renewable, recyclable or biodegradable resource inputs for our manufactured products. At ABB’s site in Porvoo, Finland, we are using post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastics for the manufacture of box supports and distance rings for our System Ideal range of flush-mounted electrical boxes. The System Ideal components are made of up to 50 percent recycled plastic, depending on the application. Thanks to circular product designs like System Ideal, in 2021, the total weight of recycled materials used in Porvoo was 64,000 kg, resulting in a reduction of some 96,000 kg of GHG emissions. We will continue to develop and release new products made from PCR plastics. Also in 2021, at our site in Ede in the Netherlands, in partnership with Ultrapolymers BC, we began to use PCR plastics for the production of surface-mounted junction boxes. By the third year of this project, we expect that each kilogram of recycled plastics used will result in an associated CO2e reduction of 1.5 kg.

Case study Reinvigorating old equipment with new retrofit solutions

Two ABB employees at work Reveal case study