GMSA on track to be landfill free

With yet another facility being declared landfill free, General Motors South Africa (GMSA) is moving closer to the company’s global environmental goal to achieve zero waste to landfill by 2020.

GMSA’s Vehicle Conversion and Distribution Centre (VCDC), situated in Aloes, about 20 km from the manufacturing plant in Port Elizabeth, is GM’s second non-manufacturing facility worldwide to achieve landfill-free status this year.

This accolade follows the Parts Distribution Centre, situated in the Coega Industrial Development Zone, which was declared landfill free in May. GM now has 134 landfill-free operations around the world.

“We started off by developing a roadmap for the site. This included waste profiling, tracking and changing processes, for instance changing car protectors used for shipping from non-recyclable to recyclable materials,” explains GMSA’s environmental group manager, Ncedisa Mzuzu.

The 31-hectare centre was opened in 2008 and has the capacity to store more than 8 000 vehicles. In addition to storage, the servicing of company fleet vehicles and the distribution of vehicles to dealers across the country is facilitated from the site.

The types of waste generated at VCDC include: oils and service-related material, paint and solvents from the on-site paint shop, scrap parts, tyres and batteries, packaging and shipping waste, fluorescent tubes and food waste from the canteen.

Most of the waste generated is being re-used or recycled. The two GMSA manufacturing plants are set to follow suit. Says Mzuzu: “The Struandale and Kemspton Road manufacturing facilities have had no waste sent to landfill sites over the last two to three months.”

The Chevrolet Utility and the Isuzu KB are manufactured at the Struandale plant, while Isuzu trucks are built at the Kempston Road plant. GMSA’s environmental management system is certified to the ISO 14001:2004 standard.