my country's machine tool mold industry actively implements green manufacturing
The field of machine tools and molds is facing an unavoidable and difficult battle. National energy-saving measures, material-saving policies, and environmental protection policies are constantly being strengthened. Moreover, the National Development and Reform Commission has clearly classified abrasive smelting into a restricted category. If companies do not carry out green manufacturing, they will most likely not be able to maintain their bottom line.
Green manufacturing is not a slogan, it is the life and death line of the abrasives industry
The abrasives and abrasives industry has not yet been labeled with the so-called "two highs and one capital", but the restrictions issued by the National Development and Reform Commission have drawn clear red lines. In 2025, the average energy consumption data of various abrasive smelting enterprises across the country was presented. That is to say, the power consumption per ton of corundum smelting is still as high as 2,200 kilowatt hours, far exceeding the internationally advanced available levels. For a large abrasives factory in Zhengzhou, Henan, because it failed to complete the task of ultra-low emission transformation, it was forced to limit its production capacity in March 2026. The production limit rate reached 30%, which directly caused losses of more than 8 million yuan.
Enterprises are bound to learn new energy-saving and emission-reducing technologies. There is a grinding tool company in Luoyang. After introducing a waste heat recovery system, the amount of heat recovered every year is equivalent to saving 1,200 tons of standard coal. This is so real. The case shows that green manufacturing of large parts processing is not a burden, but the only option to survive. Those companies that do not carry out energy-saving transformation have a probability of being eliminated in the next three years. The probability is more than 60%.
Adjust the structure and change the mode from bigger to stronger
In the field of manufacturing, China is a big country, but it is not a powerful country. The abrasives and abrasives industry has been in a situation for a long time, that is, low-end production capacity has been in excess, and the high-end part relies on imports to meet it. From the industry statistics in 2025, it can be seen that the capacity utilization rate of ordinary brown corundum abrasives does not reach 65%, and 40% of high-end precision abrasives need to be imported from Germany and Japan.
Regarding the elimination of backward production capacity, we must strictly implement an action-oriented attitude. Zibo, Shandong Province, will close 12 small corundum smelting furnaces with an annual output of less than 5,000 tons in 2025. At the same time, it will support three companies with independent research and development capabilities. Those companies that have managed to survive have reduced energy consumption per unit of product by 18% and increased the added value of their products by 25% through technological transformation. In this industry, only by cultivating a group of large-scale and powerful leading companies and a group of small-scale, distinctive "little giants" that focus on a certain field can we gain a firm foothold in the international market.
Five major green technologies in the machine tool industry have been implemented
In the machine tool industry, my country's machine tool mold industry has actively implemented green manufacturing and has taken the lead in carrying out many studies on green manufacturing. Green design technology allows machine tools to consider the disassembly recovery rate from the drawing stage. There is a machine tool factory in Shenyang. After adopting modular design, the proportion of recyclable materials when the equipment is scrapped has been increased to 85%. Reconfigurable technology allows machine tools to quickly switch production lines, thereby reducing the waste of resources caused by idle equipment.
The whole life cycle development technology focuses on the environmental impact of the entire process of machine tools from manufacturing to scrapping. There is a company in Dalian that has reduced the weight of a single machine tool by 1.2 tons by optimizing the casting structure, thus reducing steel consumption and processing energy consumption. Clean production technology focuses on the production process. A tool factory in Jiangsu completely abandoned the use of cutting fluid after adopting dry cutting technology, reducing hazardous waste emissions by 30 tons yearly.
CNC machine tool energy-saving technology directly reduces electricity costs
In the workshop, the major consumer of electricity is the green manufacturing of large parts processing of CNC machine tools. There is a large gantry machining center, which works 16 hours a day. The electricity bill incurred during this period exceeds 500 yuan. In 2025, a precision machinery factory in Foshan, Guangdong Province installed an intelligent energy-saving system for 10 CNC machine tools. By optimizing the spindle start and stop and servo drive parameters, the overall energy saving rate was 14.7%.
Variable frequency drive and potential energy recovery also belong to the category of energy-saving technologies. There is a mold company in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, which transformed the oil pump system of hydraulic machine tools. After replacing ordinary motors with servo motors, the standby energy consumption was reduced by 70%. The investment payback period of these technologies is generally within two years. For enterprises with annual electricity consumption of more than 1 million kilowatt-hours, they can save hundreds of thousands of yuan in electricity bills every year.
Improving accuracy and reducing material consumption kill two birds with one stone
The material utilization rate is directly determined by the machining accuracy of the machine tool. When the accuracy increases by one level, the blank margin can be reduced from 15% to 20%. In 2025, there was an aerospace parts processing enterprise in Deyang, Sichuan. After switching to high-rigidity precision CNC machine tools, the blank amount of titanium alloy parts was reduced from 120 kilograms to 95 kilograms, and the material saving has exceeded 20%.
Reducing material consumption means reducing carbon emissions in the smelting process. Every ton of steel saved is equivalent to a reduction of 1.8 tons of carbon dioxide emissions. A large parts processing company in Shanghai used online measurement and adaptive processing technology to reduce the scrap rate from 3.5% to 1.2%. In 2025 alone, it reduced 45 tons of metal scraps, directly saving about 600,000 yuan in material costs.
The circular economy is the final piece of the puzzle
When abrasives are smelted, a large amount of waste residue and a large amount of dust will be produced, which must be utilized as resources. There is a company engaged in corundum production in Yichuan, Henan Province. It sells the waste residue generated after smelting to cement plants and uses it as calibration material for large-scale parts processing and green manufacturing . It can earn 80 yuan per ton of waste residue. The amount of waste residue processed per year is 20,000 tons, which can increase the income by an additional 1.6 million yuan. At the same time, they also recovered the alumina component in the dust removal ash and put it into the smelting furnace again.
Equally important is water recycling. The cooling water used in the production of abrasive tools is reused after treatment. There is a company in Yancheng, Jiangsu, which has achieved zero discharge of industrial wastewater. They invested 1.2 million yuan to build a reclaimed water reuse system that can save 380,000 yuan in water bills every year. The investment can be recovered in three years. The circular economy is not a loss-making business, but an underestimated profit growth point.
In your factory or workshop, what attempts have been made to save energy, reduce consumption and reduce material waste, or what kind of resistance have you encountered? Welcome to share your practical experience in the comment area, and don’t forget to like and forward it, so that more peers can see the true value of green manufacturing.
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