The 12th Global Conference on Sustainable Manufacturing (GCSM) jointly organized by Technische Universität Berlin and Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) was officiated today by Prof. Datuk Ir. Dr. Wahid bin Omar, Vice Chancellor of UTM at a leading hotel in Johor Bahru. The conference serves as a forum for academics, researchers and practitioners from international and local universities, research institutes and industrial companies who are doing work related to the area of sustainable manufacturing.
Since its inception in 2003, GCSM has been held in 10 different countries worldwide, and this year UTM has been given the honor to jointly organise the conference. The ability of the conference to attract more than 160 contributions from more than 15 countries across 5 different continents is a testament of its significance and global appeal. In addition, the fact that the conference is sponsored by the International Academy for Production Engineering (CIRP), which is the world leading organization in production engineering research, with over 600 academic and industrial members from 50 industrialized countries, further indicates the stature of the conference.
All accepted conference papers will be published by Elsevier in the Procedia CIRP electronic journal.
An international competition for sustainable sanitation system design is also held in conjunction with GCSM 2014. The “Blue Responsibility Award: Manufacturing for a Sustainable Terra Preta Sanitation System” intends to stimulate the development of new sustainable sanitation systems that enable the reuse of human excreta. The objective of the competition is to design a sanitation system that creates the maximum value from what is today considered as waste. In total, 25 participants from 14 countries registered for the competition. A team of international jury has shortlisted seven teams for presentation at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, UTM on September 24th to determine the winners. A sum of 10 000 Euro has been set aside for the winners.
A smaller group of experts from the GCSM delegates, as well as UTM experts and CIRP fellows and affiliates, will be deliberating further with several other industrialists and industry groups; and government agencies’ representatives at UTM Kuala Lumpur on the plan to collaborate on remanufacturing and recycling technologies.