Sustainable Design

Environmental Categories

• There are three main environmental categories in the life cycle of a product.
• These affect every aspect of the products production, use and disposal.

Materials

• The materials a product is made of and how they affect the product and its sustainability.
  • How easy or difficult it is to recycle or reuse a material.
  • How difficult it is to obtain a material.

Energy

• The amount of energy required to make the product.
• The type of energy used to make a product.

Pollution/Waste

• The pollution caused by the making of a product.
• Waste when making a product, such as wasted materials or energy.

Sustainable Design Approaches

Green Design

• Designing in a way that takes account of the environmental impact of the product throughout its life.
• Focuses on only one or two of the three environmental categories.
  • Materials
  • Energy
  • Pollution/waste
• Takes around 2 to 5 years to implement.

• Generally a few incremental and/or small radical changes on one or two of the environmental categories.
• Relatively easy to implement and cost-effective.

Considerations

• When evaluating a product, the designer must consider different green approaches to design, such as:
  • Raw materials used
  • Packaging
  • Incorporation of toxic chemicals
  • Energy in production and use
  • End-of-life disposal issues
  • Production methods and/or atmospheric pollutants.

Tools

• Green design uses the prevention and precautionary principles to reduce ecological impact.

Eco Design

• Similar to green design, but takes into account all 3 environmental categories.
• Takes around 5 to 10 years to implement.

• Small radical changes to all 3 of the environmental categories makes it more complicated than green design.
• Eco design has to consider all of the considerations of green design, as it targets all environmental categories.

Sustainable Design

• Designing physical objects and services in accordance with the principles of social, economic and environmental sustainability.
• Sustainable design uses the three triple bottom line principles:
  • People (social)
  • Planet (environmental)
  • Profit (economic).
• Sustainable design generally takes around 10 to 20 years to implement.

• Relatively long due to several incremental and radical changes.
• Rethinks the nature of the product and how it may work.
• This extends the research and development (R&D) phase, and may not make it feasible to work within cost constraints.

Considerations

• When evaluating a product, the designer must consider the following sustainable strategies:
  • Circular economy
  • Clean technologies
  • Triple Bottom Line sustainability
  • Take-back policy

Tools

• Sustainable design takes into account the 5 principles of Datschefski, which are:
  • Cyclic
  • Solar
  • Safe
  • Efficient
  • Social

Tools for Designers

The Prevention Principle

• The avoidance or minimization of producing waste in relation to the production, use and disposal of a product.
• The prevention principle aims to reduce the negative impact of a product.

The Precautionary Principle

• The anticipation of potential problems in relation to the environmental impact of the production, use and disposal of a product.
• The precautionary principle designs products in a way that ensures potential issues wont occur.

Datschefski's Five Principles

Cyclic

• The product is made from compostable, organic materials or from minerals that are recycled in a continuous loop.

Solar

• The product in use consumes only renewable energy that is cyclic and safe.

Safe

• All releases to air, water, land, or space are “food” for other systems.
• For example, dumping compost as waste could be considered "food" for nature, as it would naturally degrade it.

Efficient

• Requiring 90% less energy, materials and water than equivalent products in 1990.

Social

• Its manufacture and use support basic human rights and natural justice.
• No exploitation of workers.