Productivity is the measure of a company's capacity to produce services and goods. Therefore, improving a company's productivity involves increasing the overall profit of an industry, either by increasing its output, decreasing input or increasing both parameters. This is a good science fair topic to address the means and measures required to improve productivity in various industries.
The time taken for a particular good to be produced or service to be delivered is an important aspect of production in industries and an important topic of discussion for industrial engineers. In science fairs, participants discuss ways of improving production speed, such as increasing labor, improving machines and equipment or expanding production facilities. Means of transporting products within and outside industries is also a point of discussion under this topic.
Improving or maintaining the quality of a product by an industry is a critical component of industrial engineering. Industrial engineers must come up with ideas that aid in improving the quality of the products offered. Using robots in place of human labor and decreasing the time taken to finish a product within specifications are some of the points of discussion in science fairs on industrial engineering.
All industries strive to reduce, if not completely eliminate, waste and pollution from their plants. An example of the measures that an industry can take to reduce pollution is decreasing or replacing the use of fossil fuels with renewable sources of energy, such as solar. Other means of waste and pollution reduction include recycling and reusing materials, proper disposal of waste products and planting trees.
Green technology is also referred to as clean or environmental technology. Green technology uses environmental science to develop environmentally-friendly technology to reduce the harmful environmental effects of human development. Some topics regarding green technology for discussion are the construction of green buildings, using environmentally-friendly materials and locations, as well as green chemistry that deals with discovering alternatives to toxic substances commonly used in industry.