Green Design aka Design for Environment Sustainable Design

Green Design aka Design for Environment, Sustainable Design

Sustainable? • Rates of use of renewable resources should not exceed their rates of regeneration; • Rates of use of nonrenewable resources should not exceed the rate at which sustainable renewable substitutes are developed; • Rates of pollution emission should not exceed the assimilative capacity of the environment

Deforestation

Environmental Impact • Environmental impact=Population x GDP/person x environmental impact/unit of per capita GDP

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) • • Describe which emissions will occur and which raw materials are used during the life of a product. This is usually referred to as the inventory step. Assess what the impacts of these emissions and raw material depletions are. This is referred to as the impact assessment step.

Life Cycle Assessment is multidisciplinary • Technosphere: The modelling of technical systems, such as production processes, transport processes • Ecosphere: The modelling of environmental mechanisms ("what happens with an emission? "). • Valuesphere: Dealing with subjective choices. This includes weighting of impact categories, selection of time horizon.

LCA for new Honda Insight (simplified: energy only) Al Steel Rubber Kg mat’l used in Honda 336 168 Kwh per Kg to produce 6. 6 . 66 3 MPG Kwh/gal Honda, 2218 Gasoline Total Kwh Saved Kwh 87023 34. 8 222 504 51 68200 71143 0 0 22 158166 Kwh LCA Subaru 0 Kwh LCA

LCA for Insight (cont. ) • Each Kwh of energy saved, prevents. 65 kg of CO 2 being added to the atmosphere. • So, saving 87023 Kwh over the lifetime of the Insight means 56 metric tons less CO 2 in the atmosphere • For comparison, the world adds 30 billion tons of CO 2 per year

1. Don’t design products, but life cycles Don’t design "green" products. Instead, design environmentally sound product life cycles. Think about all material inputs and energy use of a product during its whole life cycle. From cradle to grave, or even better from cradle to cradle! One way to document your findings is the MET matrix (Materials, Energy, Toxicity). Enter some of the most important facts in a matrix: MET Production Use Disposal Materials Energy Toxicity

2. Don’t design products, but services People do not always want a product. They want a solution for a certain problem. A service rather than a product can be the right solution. For example, a car sharing system is a solution for people that need a car occasionally. Zipcar is becoming popular in Boston, where parking space is at a premium. You can use one of the cars in your neighborhood when you need it.

3. Natural materials are not always better It is a common belief that "natural" materials are more environmentally friendly than "artificial" or man made materials. Is this always true? Of course, the production of 1 kg of wood causes less emissions than the production of 1 kg of plastic. But what about the paint to preserve the wood, the energy needed to dry, the sawing losses? In some products, you would need about ten times as much wood as plastic. Plastics can often be recycled, wood cannot.

4. Energy consumption: often underestimated If a product consumes energy in the use phase, it’s likely that its energy consumption has greater environmental impact than the materials used. 10 k. Wh electricity needs 2 kg of oil. Making 1 kg of plastic needs 1. 5 to 2. 5 kg of oil. A coffee machine uses 300 k. Wh electricity during its lifetime, equal to 60 kg of oil. For the production of the machine less than 1 kg of plastic is used

5. Increase product life time You can influence the product life time in several ways: Make it more durable from a technical point of view, or make it upgradeable (allowing installation of the latest chip in a computer). More importantly, try to design the product in such a way that people will feel attached to it. Many products are thrown away not because they are broken, but because owners got bored with them.

6. Use a minimum of material Using less materials may seem obvious, but it can be difficult to do. Often you can reduce the amount of material by critically looking at dimensions, required strength and production techniques. -shape (ribs, bosses, forming of sheet metal) reduce req’d thickness -substitution of materials with less environmental impact It can even be beneficial to use materials that have a high environmental load per kilogram, if you can save weight. This is particularly true in transport, where less weight means less fuel consumption.

7. Make your product recyclable Most products can be recycled, but relatively few are. You can increase the chance that the product will be recycled: Products that can be disassembled easily and have a high yield are preferred for recycling. Metals can be effectively recycled. -Copper components reduce recyclability of steel -Recycling aluminum saves a lot of energy compared to smelting Make sure thermoplastics can be recycled: -Do not use a lacquer or paper stickers on plastic -Do not combine different plastics. Thermosets cannot be effectively recycled. Paper can be recycled, but fiber length decreases with each pass

8. Use recycled materials Do not only make your product recyclable, but use recycled materials. Don’t specify “virgin material”; specify performance instead of source. Demand for recycled materials encourages recycling. And there are energy economies: Aluminum from ore requires 13 kwh/kg Recycled aluminum requires. 65 kwh/kg Virgin rubber requires 10 kwh/kg Recycled rubber requires 3 kwh/kg

9. Replace toxic and hazardous materials Aramid fibers replace asbestos in automotive brake linings Hydrofluorocarbons replace chlorofluorocarbons in air conditioners Hydrofluoroalkanes replace chlorofluorocarbons in aerosol cans Citrus-oil cleaners replace toxics like CCl 4 Silver replaces lead in plumbing solder Zinc and nickel replace cadmium plating for screws and nuts

10. Ask stupid questions! Very often decisions are based on common practice: "We have always done it this way and it has always worked well". Remember that Design for Environment is relatively new. Many existing products were designed without consideration of their environmental impact. You can make huge improvements in the environmental performance of products, with consequential cost savings, by simply asking "Why? ".

LCA Software • Most projects involve such a large number of inputs and outputs, that software has become available to keep track of it all. • One package is Sima. Pro, available from Pre Consultants (www. pre. nl) • Another is TEAM, from Ecobilan (www. ecobilan. com/uk_team. php) • A longer list at www. howproductsimpact. net/box/home/lcasoftware. htm

You can contact sustainable design organizations A couple of them are: O 2: an international organization. The US affiliate is at www. O 2 -usa. org Centre for Sustainable Design, UK at www. cfsd. org. uk

Bibliography • Design For Environment. T. E. Graedel and Allenby, B. R. Prentice Hall 1998. • Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things. W. Mc. Donough and M. Braungart, 2002. • Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution - Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, L. Hunter Lovins