In a factory, sustainability is built into everyday operations: it lives in maintenance routines, energy monitoring, smart system settings, and the discipline to prevent problems before they occur. At VMI Poland, Maciej Nowakowski combines his role as Facility Manager with his work as a Sustainability Ambassador, focusing on practical improvements that deliver measurable results.
VMI launched its Sustainability Program in Poland in April 2026. Maciej leads the local Operations pillar and coordinates a team of more than ten people. Their priorities are the areas operations can influence directly, monitoring and optimizing energy consumption, reducing waste in water and raw materials, and embedding environmental targets into everyday facility management and maintenance processes.
Energy transparency is central to Maciej’s approach. Each month he tracks electricity consumption and compares grid power with energy produced by the site’s photovoltaic (PV) panels, including any surplus sent back to the grid. Commissioning the PV installation stands out as a major milestone because it delivered clear benefits: a lower carbon footprint and reduced operating costs. “For me, this reinforces a simple idea: sustainability is good operations, done smartly”, says Maciej.
He also sees energy efficiency as a strong business case: “Cutting consumption reduces our environmental impact and our expenses, and it helps us stay competitive as customers increasingly expect suppliers to meet ESG requirements and report carbon footprints.”
Maciej emphasizes that success depends on people as much as technology. One of the biggest challenges is changing habits and keeping sustainability aligned with daily priorities. To make it real, he connects sustainability to Kaizen, encouraging employees to find small improvements. A concrete example is lighting: his team introduced automated schedules to switch lights off during planned breaks, reducing unnecessary consumption.
Maintenance is another high-impact lever. Predictive maintenance helps prevent avoidable energy losses and issues such as refrigerant leaks from large air-conditioning systems, which can carry significant CO₂-equivalent impact. His guiding principle is straightforward:
“Prevent and inspect rather than repair after the fact.”
Looking ahead, Maciej believes VMI can move toward climate-neutral leadership by staying consistent, keep optimizing, keep engaging people, and keep proving that environmental progress and business performance can go together.
