About 850,000 vehicles reach the end of their lives each year in Australia. That equates to about 980,000 tonnes of waste produced per year.
ACM Parts is an Australian leader when it comes to finding ways to re-use, recycle and re-purpose vehicle parts and components.
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It also aims to lead the charge when it comes to sustainability.
ACM Parts Executive General Manager Adam O’Sullivan said the company annually dismantles about 8,000 vehicles, salvaging more than 100,000 parts and subassemblies.
“That doesn’t sound like many vehicles, but it makes us the biggest dismantler in Australia by far,” he said.
“A lot of those 850,000 cars end up in the scrapyard … a huge amount of them end up overseas. They get put in containers and sent to other countries around the world where the recycling practises aren’t to the same standard that they are in Australia.
“We know that we hold ourselves to a standard which means there is very little negative environmental impact from our end.”
ACM Parts and parent company AMA Group have registered a more than 50 per cent increase in usage of recycled parts nationally.
Nothing to waste
While ACM Parts can salvage plenty of parts fit for re-selling, it also finds uses for parts that can’t be saved.
This includes recyclable and returnable packaging, which is made from reused bumper bars.
“Those parts go to a recycler, who then turns it into reusable packaging that we use as we put parts on the shelf,” Adam said.
“We get them back from our customers and use them again and again. It adds a circular piece to that packaging component.”
ACM Parts is also continuing to expand its headlamp refurbishment program, as the cost of replacing a full headlight rises for consumers.
“We harvest all our headlamps from dismantling sites … if we can repair those by replacing lug or polishing a lens for example, we can put those back into the circular economy.
“With the complexity and technology going into headlights, it’s not uncommon for them to cost $2,500.
“If we can repair something like a small crack within the housing in the headlight, we can save the insurer or end customer the cost of replacing it with a brand-new component.”
This initiative results in more than 2,000 lamps going back into the market. It also underscores ACM Parts’ drive to re-introduce many useable components, thus mitigating the mass production of brand-new parts.
Reduce, reuse, recycle
ACM Parts has been shortlisted for the Australian Financial Review’s Sustainability Leaders List.
This list showcases Australia’s leaders in successful utilising sustainable practises in their business model(s).
Find out more information about ACM Parts and its sustainability push online at acmparts.com.au