A Methodology for Identifying Environmentally Conscious Guidelines for Product Design

2010 ◽  
Vol 132 (9) ◽  
Author(s):  
Cassandra Telenko ◽  
Carolyn Conner Seepersad
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Reverse Engineering ◽  
Product Design ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Design Guidelines ◽  
Environmentally Conscious ◽  
Current Knowledge Base ◽  
Environmentally Conscious Design ◽  
General Method

A reverse engineering methodology is presented for identifying environmentally conscious design guidelines for use in the conceptual stages of product design. Environmentally conscious principles and guidelines help designers improve environmental impacts of products by making better decisions during conceptual design stages when data for life cycle analysis (LCA) are sometimes scarce. The difficulty in using the current knowledge base of guidelines is that it is not exhaustive and conflicts are not well understood. In response, the authors propose a general method for expanding the current set of guidelines and for understanding potential environmental tradeoffs. The method helps designers extract environmentally conscious design guidelines from a set of functionally related products by combining reverse engineering with LCA. The guidelines and LCA results can then be used to inform subsequent design cycles without repeating the process. Although in environmentally conscious design, reverse engineering is commonly applied to studies of disassembly and recyclability, the methodology and case study herein show how reverse engineering can be applied to the utilization stage of a product’s life cycle as well. The method is applied to an example of electric kettles to demonstrate its utility for uncovering new design guidelines.

A Method for Developing Design for Environment Guidelines for Future Product Design

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cassandra Telenko ◽  
Carolyn C. Seepersad ◽  
Michael E. Webber
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Energy Consumption ◽  
Reverse Engineering ◽  
Product Design ◽  
Life Cycle Analysis ◽  
Design Guidelines ◽  
Design For Environment ◽  
General Description ◽  
General Methodology

Design for environment principles and guidelines help designers create greener products during the early stages of design when life cycle analysis is not feasible. However, the available guidelines are not exhaustive and a general methodology for discovering guidelines has yet to be proposed. In this paper, a method for identifying green design guidelines is presented, which aims to fulfill the need for more comprehensive guidelines. The method combines typical aspects of product design, such as customer needs analysis, with reverse engineering and life cycle analysis. Although reverse engineering is commonly applied to studies of disassembly and recyclability, the methodology and case study herein show how reverse engineering can be applied to areas of product utilization and energy consumption in particular. A general description of the methodology helps readers apply it to their own studies, and a case study of electric kettles shows how each step of the method was applied to reveal four new design guidelines.

Integrating DFX Tools With Computer-Aided Design Systems

1998 ◽  
Author(s):  
Uma-Sankar Kalyan-Seshu ◽  
Bert Bras
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Computer Aided Design ◽  
Design Guidelines ◽  
Life Cycle Assessments ◽  
Environmentally Conscious ◽  
Life Cycle Design ◽  
Design Systems ◽  
Environmentally Conscious Design ◽  
Aided Design

Abstract The growing emphasis on environmentally conscious design and manufacturing approaches has placed new burdens on designers. The amount of information available to designers is of great significance in making life cycle assessments on a product. However, well-established commercial CAD systems do not provide means for evaluating most of the different life cycle aspects of the product being modeled. Hence there is a need to have a CAD-environment where the life cycle tools (DFX tools in this work) are integrated with these systems so that life cycle design is made possible. In the research discussed in this paper, the specific focus is to enable the quantification and enhancement of product assemblability, serviceability, recyclability, remanufacturability, de-manufacturability, and life cycle impact during product design. Guidelines for integrating some of the commercially available CAD packages (I-DEAS and Pro/ENGINEER) to these assessment models, and ways to use the input information to some these assessments for making other assessments are developed. A case study is given to illustrate the approach.

Comparison of environmental performance between plastic and steel fuel tanks

2002 ◽  
Vol 216 (11) ◽  
pp. 1443-1457 ◽  
Author(s):  
C-y Tung ◽  
M H Wang
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Product Design ◽  
Environmental Performance ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Environmentally Conscious ◽  
Performance Technique ◽  
Life Cycle Design ◽  
Fuel Tanks ◽  
Environmentally Conscious Design ◽  
Whole Life Cycle

Increasing awareness of environmental burdens has led companies and designers to initiate design for the environment (DFE) programmes, which consider the design of products from the ‘cradle to grave’ and is also known as ‘life-cycle design’. In this paper, the use of a novel environmental performance technique to be used at the early stage of product design is presented. This technique, which is to be used as a framework for green product design, is demonstrated in this paper by evaluating the environmental performance between plastic and steel fuel tanks. The fuel tank comparison can be divided into five steps. In the first four steps, a modified house of quality (HOQ) is used to analyse the performance of fuel tanks in terms of requirements of environmentally conscious design. The final step is an overall assessment that synthesizes the results from the previous four analyses. As a result, the comprehensive environmental effects in the whole life cycle of fuel tanks are captured in the early stage of design.

scholarly journals Design of Consumables in a Resource-Efficient Economy—A Literature Review

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 1036
Author(s):  
Siri Willskytt
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Product Design ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Design Guidelines ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Specific Design ◽  
Design Considerations ◽  
Life Cycle Perspective ◽  
General Product

Consumable products have received less attention in the circular economy (CE), particularly in regard to the design of resource-efficient products. This literature review investigates the extent to which existing design guidelines for resource-efficient products are applicable to consumables. This analysis is divided into two parts. The first investigates the extent to which general product-design guidelines (i.e., applicable to both durables and consumables) are applicable to consumables. This analysis also scrutinizes the type of recommendations presented by the ecodesign and circular product design, to investigate the novel aspects of the CE in product design. The second analysis examines the type of design considerations the literature on product-type specific design guidelines recommends for specific consumables and whether such guidelines are transferable. The analysis of general guidelines showed that, although guidelines are intended to be general and applicable to many types of products, their applicability to consumable products is limited. Less than half of their recommendations can be applied to consumables. The analysis also identified several design considerations that are transferable between product-specific design guidelines. This paper shows the importance of the life-cycle perspective in product design, to maximize the opportunities to improve consumables.

Reliability Analysis of Repairable Systems Subject to System Modifications

1998 ◽  
Author(s):  
Z. H. Jiang ◽  
L. H. Shu ◽  
B. Benhabib
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Steady State ◽  
Cost Estimation ◽  
Life Cycle Cost ◽  
Repairable Systems ◽  
Environmentally Conscious ◽  
Reliability Indices ◽  
Reliability Models ◽  
System Reconfiguration ◽  
Environmentally Conscious Design

Abstract This paper approaches environmentally conscious design by further developing a reliability model that facilitates design for reuse. Many reliability models are not suitable for describing systems that undergo repairs performed during remanufacture and maintenance because the models do not allow the possibility of system reconfiguration. In this paper, expressions of reliability indices of a model that allows system reconfiguration are developed to enable life-cycle cost estimation for repairable systems. These reliability indices of a population of repairable systems are proven theoretically to reach steady state. The expressions of these indices at steady state are obtained to gain insight into the model behavior, and to facilitate life-cycle cost estimation.

scholarly journals Factors Influencing the Private Involvement in Urban Rail Public-Private Partnership Projects in China

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yongjian Ke ◽  
Weiya Hao ◽  
Huiping Ding ◽  
Yingying Wang
Keyword(s):  
Influencing Factors ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Group Discussion ◽  
Risk Allocation ◽  
Financial Model ◽  
Urban Rail ◽  
Current Knowledge Base ◽  
Private Investors ◽  
Fiscal Pressure

Private investors have been encouraged to participate in the development and operation of urban rail projects in China through Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs), given the fact that subnational governments are suffering from urgent development demands and severe fiscal pressure. However, there is no formal assessment to determine the private involvement in a PPP project. This problem is particularly critical in the sector of urban rail, in which the huge investment cannot rely on the private sector alone. This study hence aimed to uncover and identify the influencing factors. Multiple research methods, including content analysis, case study and focus group discussion were adopted to achieve the research purpose. Seven types of influencing factors were identified, including project financial model, government fiscal commitment, risk allocation, public accountability, efficiency considerations, policy and regulations, and organisational marketing strategies. The findings add to the current knowledge base by uncovering the drivers behind private involvement in a PPP project. They are also beneficial for industry practitioners as a basis/checklist to determine the private involvement.

scholarly journals Design for and from Recycling: A Circular Ecodesign Approach to Improve the Circular Economy

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (23) ◽  
pp. 9861
Author(s):  
Jorge Martínez Leal ◽  
Stéphane Pompidou ◽  
Carole Charbuillet ◽  
Nicolas Perry
Keyword(s):  
Product Design ◽  
End Of Life ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Time Lag ◽  
Design Guidelines ◽  
Design Phase ◽  
Design For Recycling ◽  
Circular Design

In the context of a circular economy, one can observe that (i) recycling chains are not adapted enough to the end-of-life products they have to process and that (ii) products are not sufficiently well designed either to integrate at best their target recycling chain. Therefore, a synergy between product designers and recycling-chains stakeholders is lacking, mainly due to their weak communication and the time-lag between the product design phase and its end-of-life treatment. Many Design for Recycling approaches coexist in the literature. However, to fully develop a circular economy, Design from Recycling also has to be taken into account. Thus Re-Cycling, a complete circular design approach, is proposed. First, a design for recycling methodology linking recyclability assessment to product design guidelines is proposed. Then, a design from recycling methodology is developed to assess the convenience of using secondary raw materials in the design phase. The recyclability of a smartphone and the convenience of using recycled materials in a new cycle are both analyzed to demonstrate our proposal. The Fairphone 2® and its treatment by the WEEE French takeback scheme are used as a case study.

A Requirement-Centered Design Support System for the Environmentally Conscious Product

2000 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kei Kurakawa ◽  
Kumiyo Nakakoji ◽  
Takashi Kiriyama
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Product Life Cycle ◽  
Visual Presentation ◽  
Design Team ◽  
Life Cycle Model ◽  
Cycle Model ◽  
Environmentally Conscious ◽  
Design Support System ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Environmentally Conscious Design

Abstract We have developed the Green Browser to support a team of designers to collaboratively construct and share the product life cycle information for environmentally conscious design. We developed the ReqC model (Requirement-Centered Model) and the GLC model (Green Life-Cycle Model) for structuring design information in the Green Browser. The system allows the design team to construct the GLC model by chunking discourse and assigning types. It provides a visual presentation of the concept and scenario, and allows the user outside the team to share the model across different computer environments. We used Java2 and CORBA for system implementation. To test implementation of the system, we built a GLC model by using data collected in an industrial design project.

Experiences of Teaching “Life Cycle Design” Course at Tokyo Metropolitan University

Manufacturing ◽  
2003 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yasushi Umeda
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Manufacturing Industry ◽  
Environmental Issues ◽  
Life Cycle Thinking ◽  
Environmentally Conscious ◽  
Tokyo Metropolitan ◽  
Life Cycle Design ◽  
Teaching Life ◽  
Metropolitan University ◽  
Environmentally Conscious Design

This paper describes the outline of “life cycle design” course the author teaches and illustrates some experiences and findings with results of questionnaires to attendees of the lecture. “Life cycle design” is a half-year course to third-year students at Tokyo Metropolitan University, Japan. The main subject is environmentally conscious design focusing on life cycle thinking. This course intends to establish general and correct viewpoints toward relationship between manufacturing industry and the environmental issues, which are indispensable knowledge as mechanical engineers, rather than to educate environmental specialists. Results of questionnaires indicate that this course succeeded in increasing students’ interest in this area and awareness of importance of the environmental issues. However, some students feel bewildered because of wide variety of topics and, therefore, lack of a central theory.

Application of life cycle assessment and Monte Carlo simulation for enabling sustainable product design

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 307-315 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sekar Vinodh ◽  
Gopinath Rathod
Keyword(s):  
Monte Carlo Simulation ◽  
Monte Carlo ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Product Design ◽  
Sustainable Product Design ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Sustainable Product ◽  
Manufacturing Organization

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present an integrated technical and economic model to evaluate the reusability of products or components. Design/methodology/approach – Life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology is applied to obtain the product’s environmental performance. Monte Carlo simulation is utilized for enabling sustainable product design. Findings – The results show that the model is capable of assessing the potential reusability of used products, while the usage of simulation significantly increases the effectiveness of the model in addressing uncertainties. Research limitations/implications – The case study has been conducted in a single manufacturing organization. The implications derived from the study are found to be practical and useful to the organization. Practical implications – The paper reports a case study carried out for an Indian rotary switches manufacturing organization. Hence, the model is practically feasible. Originality/value – The article presents a study that investigates LCA and simulation as enablers of sustainable product design. Hence, the contributions of this article are original and valuable.

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