Introducing Standards and Sustainable Design

Abstract

Abstract The ABET Engineering Criteria require a capstone design project where students use “appropriate engineering standards.” One of the ABET design constraints that students must consider is “sustainability.” The new United States Standards Strategy has as one of its goals to “establish standards education as a high priority within the United States private, public and academic sectors.” The first Fundamental Canon of the ASCE Code of Ethics states in part that civil engineers “shall strive to comply with the principles of sustainable development in the performance of their professional duties.” ASTM E 2432-05 Standard Guide for General Principles of Sustainability Relative to Buildings provides a framework for organizing student design projects to accomplish multiple objectives. However, IEEE’s experience in introducing standards in senior design courses indicates that the senior year may be too late and that the introduction to standards should occur in the first or second year. The purpose of this paper is to outline strategies for including standards and sustainability in courses throughout curricula to build the experience, knowledge, and interest necessary to fulfill the ABET capstone requirements in a meaningful way.