Environmentally Conscious Design Research Articles

Nomographs for Polymeric Material Selection for Environmental Conscious Design of Industrial Products

Environmentally-conscious product design using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) deserves the utmost attention to save and sustain our planet’s lives, flora and fauna. The choice of materials during the design stage needs to address environmental concerns from their sourcing to production and ultimately going up to the disposal stage. A good majority of industrial products are still not designed, focusing the environmental concerns. The inclusion and practice of the LCA approach during product designing are in a nascent stage not only in India but even over the rest of the world. Nowadays, polymers share a major chunk of the volume of goods produced worldwide and thus have a significant effect on the environment. The available design books or nomographs guide the selection of materials considering several criteria but not considering the related environmental issues. This paper attempts to bridge this gap only for the selection of polymeric materials by providing some easily interpretable and visually ready reckoners in the form of 3-D nomographs. These 3-D nomographs, graphical representations developed using the Solidworks software, echo the material’s Environmental Impact (EI) potential on an axis with some two material properties (e.g., tensile strength and density) on the other two axes. 3-D nomographs are suitably transformed into 2-D nomographs without the loss of any information. EIs on these nomographs were computed using SimaPro software. The potential EI of any product and the overall environmental burden due to them can be significantly reduced, and more so when they are mass-produced, by selecting the right materials using these nomographs. Such an approach will help in fulfilling long-term sustainable development goals of society and the globe.

Special Issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability

This is the sixth special issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability. As the first special issue on this topic was issued in 2009, the topic has thirteen years of history in this journal. Environmental sustainability was recognized as important for manufacturing even at that time. This is why the special issue was started in this journal. The seriousness of this topic has been increasing not only in Europe but also in Japan and other countries. One critical trend as of late has been the way that the attitude of companies regarding this issue, including their positions on carbon neutrality, circular economy, and biodiversity, has come to determine the value of the company in the eyes of, for example, environment, society, and governance (ESG) finance. Nowadays, we cannot say sustainability or business; we should pursue businesses that contribute to sustainability. This sixth special issue includes eighteen well-written papers, with one more paper to follow. This series of special issues has focused on topics related to ecodesign, recycling, remanufacturing, low-energy and low-emission manufacturing, and circular economy. The papers in this special issue are also deeply related to these topics. As a result of the thirteen-year history of the special issue, we have been able to learn some viewpoints specific to the series in this journal. This has led this special issue to consist of four subcategories, although they are not explicitly represented in the table of contents. The first subcategory consists of seven papers, from the first paper by K. Halada et al. to the seventh paper by A. Yoshimura et al. These papers are related to design, including evaluation, business, remanufacturing, and materials. Among others, the important viewpoint common to these papers is the “flow” of product lifecycles and materials. The second category starts with the eighth paper by C. Ye et al. and ends with the eleventh paper by Y. Yamashita et al. These papers deal with manufacturing issues in the context of the environmental sustainability. For example, the eighth paper deals with the crushing of a photovoltaic panel, and the nineth paper by T. Cheng et al. deals with detecting lithium-ion battery fires, which are a serious problem for recycling plants. The application of additive manufacturing to remanufacturing discussed in the tenth paper by N. Sato et al. is also an important topic in the field of sustainable manufacturing. The third subcategory consists of three papers, from the twelfth paper by J.-C. Tu et al. to the fourteenth by A. Y. T. Panuju et al. These are related to consumer behavior. The fourth subcategory, from the fifteenth paper by M. Kojima to the last paper by S. Tajima, deals with issues related to developing countries and locality. These two topics of consumer behavior and developing countries are indispensable to the discussion of environmental sustainability, yet they are rarely discussed in engineering journals. The editor believes that no other journal deals with these four subcategories in a special issue. Most of the papers, revised and extended in response to the editor’s invitations, were originally presented at EcoDesign 2021: the 12th International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing, which was held online. The editor sincerely thanks the authors and reviewers for their devoted work in making this special issue possible. We hope that these articles will encourage further research into design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability.

European Commission Energy-Related Products Ecodesign Directive and Fujitsu’s Environmentally Conscious Design Regarding Electrical and Electric Equipment

European Commission Energy-Related Products Ecodesign Directive and Fujitsu’s Environmentally Conscious Design Regarding Electrical and Electric Equipment

DTM to NURBS—A Parametric Approach to Landscape Modeling for an Environmentally-Conscious Design

This research aims to develop a methodology for geometric analysis of the territory, which, by means of a specially designed digital tool, allows quantitative assessments useful for drawing up sustainability policies. The difficulty of working with this type of procedure is the sectorialisation of technical skills among those who deal with design at the architectural scale and those who work at territorial scale. The undertaken methodology establishes a workflow that can export data from a GIS tool and import it into a three-dimensional modeler. To do this you need an intermediate tool, a parametric software. The explained procedure aims to have maximum freedom of model geometries processing. Therefore, it has been based on Nurbs mathematical models. The application tested with this is the solar radiation analysis in the territory of Ortona, Italy, on the Adriatic coast. Starting from the cartographic data of the Abruzzo Region, the three-dimensional model has been developed and it has built a base for further analysis. This working methodology ensures efficient results with a low amount of human iteration to generate the final model. Some of the procedure’s limitations have been explained in detail, mainly due to the structure of the used components.

A review of technology assessment of green gasoline processing

Bio-based energy has become one of the most desired energy sources before oil discovery for its efficient combustion and low price. However, the extensive use of fossil fuel and the depletion of oil reserves creating a more increasing level and accumulation of greenhouse gases in the earth’s atmosphere that leads to the development of the environmentally-conscious design of processes and products in green and sustainable Bio-based energy. In some regions, Biorefinery plants even became the main focus as they are getting popular these days, one of the developments is Green Gasoline processing. This paper provides a review of processes involved in bio-based conversion (including pre-treatment, catalyst mechanism, distillation, and treatment) as well as the green gasoline commercial plant in different regions in the world. This review also includes co-processing processes available in the market in addition to emerging technologies proposed in these areas under a proven scheme that has a promising approach for fossil fuel replacement.

Special Issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability

This is the fifth Special Issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability. The first Special Issue on this topic was issued in 2009, and the previous one was in 2018. The acceptance of sustainability has been increasing, as evidenced by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), various carbon neutral movements, and, among others, the gradual recognition of potential impacts of the EU’s “Circular Economy,” which promotes circulation-based businesses to increase the employment and market competitiveness of the EU. This increase in acceptance has brought with it increased activity in the research area of design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability, with the result that this fifth Special Issue includes seventeen well-written papers, a significant increase over the six that appeared in the fourth. The first paper “Potential Impacts of the European Union’s Circular Economy Policy on Japanese Manufacturers” overviews the EU’s Circular Economy and points out key enabling technologies. To approach environmental sustainability, we should promote various technologies related to ecodesign, process technologies, business strategy, and digital technology. At the same time, we must focus on life cycle design and management, an indispensable technology which synthesizes a sustainable circulation system by integrating the technologies mentioned above. Accordingly, this Special Issue covers both aspects, with the seventeen manuscripts in it organized as follows. The first three papers, authored by Y. Umeda et al., K. Halada, and M. Kojima, give overviews and discuss requirements for technological development. The next two manuscripts by K. Fujimoto et al. and Y. Kikuchi et al. discuss modeling, simulation, and assessment of circulation systems. Papers six to eight, written by W.-H. Chung et al., S. Yamada et al., and K. Yoda et al. develop life cycle design methods. The remaining manuscripts advance fundamental technologies. Manuscripts nine to eleven, by R. Yonemoto et al., T. Samukawa et al., and Y. Yaguchi et al., deal with sustainable manufacturing. Finally, six manuscripts by C. Tokoro et al., K. Tsuji et al., A. Ogawa et al., A. Yoshimura et al., T. Hiruta et al., and S. Nasu et al. are about life cycle processes; recycling technologies and product use phase such as car sharing and maintenance. Most of the papers, revised and extended in response to the editor’s invitations, were originally presented at EcoDesign 2019: the 11th International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing, held in Yokohama, Japan. The editor sincerely thanks the authors and reviewers for their devoted work in making this Special Issue possible. We hope that these articles will encourage further research into design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability.

An Energy-Related Products Compliant Eco-Design Method with Durability-Embedded Economic and Environmental Assessments

Assessing the environmental impacts of product systems has become critical, with emphasis on reducing carbon dioxide emissions in line with the new climate change regime. Accordingly, environmental regulations have been newly issued or have stronger requirements for inducing more energy-efficient and environmentally-conscious product development. Therefore, product developers in new product development are being forced to consider various and heterogeneous design performance and are encountering more difficulty and chaos when selecting the best product design among design candidates. The relevant studies have contributed to providing tools and techniques for increasing the environmental soundness of the product; however, they do not holistically accommodate the quantification of functional and economic metrics, nor do they incorporate the compliance with recent environmental legislations. The present work proposes an environmentally-conscious design method that integrates functional, economic, and environmental assessments with the compliance of the energy-related products (ErP) legislation. This method provides analytical capabilities including: (1) a functional assessment to derive the durability of the product to be embedded for practical measurement in the following assessments, (2) a compliance check to ensure that energy-related products fulfill the ErP directive enacted by the European Union, (3) an economic assessment to calculate the total cost during the product lifecycle by using the life cycle cost concept, and (4) an environmental assessment to quantify the environmental loads of the product by using a simplified life cycle assessment. The present work also includes a case study to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method; to this end, two different electronic vacuum cleaners are compared. The results of the present work help product developers use life cycle design thinking for determining their design parameters by checking their compliance with the ErP legislation and assessing economic and environmental metrics with a mechanical analysis of the durability of product systems.

Special Issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability

This is the fourth special issue on design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability. While Japanese manufacturers are not so active in this field, the trend of integrating sustainability into manufacturing activities and management of companies is becoming dominant. We can point out three epoch-making instances: namely, United Nations’ ‘Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),’ which consists of 17 goals to be achieved by 2030, covering not only environmental sustainability but also social and human sustainability; EU’s ‘Circular Economy,’ which promotes various routes for resource circulation (e.g., reuse, remanufacturing, maintenance, and recycling) for increasing employment and market competitiveness of EU and resource efficiency; and ‘Paris Agreement’ on climate change, which enforces reduction of the emission of greenhouse gases to zero by the end of this century. This special issue includes six well-written papers, all of which are deeply related to these three policies. The first four papers focus on product life cycle or even multiple product life cycles. This aspect is an inherent feature of design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability, which was not considered in traditional design and manufacturing. The keywords of these four papers are life cycle CO2 emission evaluation of electric vehicles, life cycle simulation of reuse among multiple product life cycles, disassembly part selection based on the idea of life expectancy, and personalization design aiming at avoiding mass production and mass disposal. The latter two papers are rather fresh in this journal. The fifth paper deals with customer preferences in Indonesia. Focusing on life styles in developing countries is a very important topic emphasized in SDGs. The last paper deals with food waste, which is emphasized in both SDGs and Circular Economy. Most of the papers, revised and extended in response to the editor’s invitations, were originally presented at EcoDesign 2017: the tenth International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing, held in Tainan, Taiwan. The editor sincerely thanks the authors and reviewers for their devoted work in making this special issue possible. We hope that these articles will encourage further research on design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability.

Estimating energy consumption of injection moulding for environmental-driven mould design

Supporting environmentally-conscious design of moulds is the ultimate objective of the here presented advisory tool. Relying on a careful estimation of the energy used for the injection moulding process, the designer is guided towards the development of green(er) solutions. As shown by literature and through a preliminary LCA screening analysis, most of the environmental impacts of a mould are directly connected to the energy consumed during the injection phase. This paper proposes a guideline for a reliable and sensitive energy estimation of the injection moulding process, taking into account not only the part and the material to be moulded, but also the specifications of the mould, the injection moulding machine and the injection moulding process parameters. The accurate estimation of the energy consumed may radically improve the estimation of the overall environmental impacts of the mould and of the moulded product, and provide a value-added support for eco-driven decision making since the mould design phase. This work aims at contributing to the development of new methodologies to help injection moulding industry to develop more sustainable parts, moulds and processes.

Emergy-based sustainability assessment of different energy options for green buildings

It is necessary to minimize the environmental impact and utilize natural resources in a sustainable and efficient manner in the early design stage of developing an environmentally-conscious design for a heating, ventilating and air-conditioning system. Energy supply options play a significant role in the total environmental load of heating, ventilating and air-conditioning systems. To assess the environmental impact of different energy options, a new method based on Emergy Analysis is proposed. Emergy Accounting, was first developed and widely used in the area of ecological engineering, but this is the first time it has been used in building service engineering. The environmental impacts due to the energy options are divided into four categories under the Emergy Framework: the depletion of natural resources, the greenhouse effect (carbon dioxide equivalents), the chemical rain effect (sulfur dioxide equivalents), and anthropogenic heat release. The depletion of non-renewable natural resources is indicated by the Environmental Load Ratio, and the environmental carrying capacity is developed to represent the environmental service to dilute the pollutants and anthropogenic heat released. This Emergy evaluation method provides a new way to integrate different environmental impacts under the same framework and thus facilitates better system choices. A case study of six different kinds of energy options consisting of renewable and non-renewable energy was performed by using Emergy Theory, and thus their relative environmental impacts were compared. The results show that the method of electricity generation in energy sources, especially for electricity-powered systems, is the most important factor to determine their overall environmental performance. The direct-fired lithium-bromide absorption type consumes more non-renewable energy, and contributes more to the urban heat island effect compared with other options having the same electricity supply. Using Emergy Analysis, designers and clients can make better-informed, environmentally-conscious selections of heating, ventilating and air-conditioning systems.

Environment-Conscious Design in Ricoh MPC2503 and Staple-less Staple.

Environment-Conscious Design in Ricoh MPC2503 and Staple-less Staple.

住宅設計演習における環境配慮的な提案の実態に関する研究

The purpose of this study is to discuss the effects of "Wooden Craftsmanship Activity" and environmental consideration in design exercise on the students majoring in architecture. We conducted a questionnaire survey on the students. The main results are as follows; 1) "WCA" participants mainly enjoy designing and are motivated by the sense of achievement that comes with accomplishing an assignment, and that they are proposing specific environment conscious design in design exercise. 2) "WCA" has an effect on consciousness and behavior of environment conscious life, including classes at university

Special Issue on Design and Manufacturing for Environmental Sustainability

This issue focuses on design and manufacturing theories and methodologies aimed at achieving environmental sustainability. It has been two decades since environmental sustainability and related issues have been discussed as main issues in design and manufacturing. In these 20 years, theories and methodologies have been developed on environmentally conscious design, including the design of disassembly and life cycle assessment, and manufacturing techniques for saving energy and resources and low emission. In spite of these efforts, the seriousness of the environmental issues, e.g., global warming, is getting harder and harder and new issues continuously arise. It has gradually been recognized that essential problems reside within the manufacturing industry structure and the center of the manufacturing industry has shifted from developed countries such as Japan and US to developing countries with accelerating mass production and mass consumption. Based on this recognition, this special issues deals with rather novel topics emerging in the domain of design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability. The first five papers provide a global scope on the relationship between environmental sustainability and manufacturing industry, including global energy consumption patterns, manufacturing industry scenario writing, informative reviews on lean remanufacturing, urban mining, and education on resource scarcity. The second three papers focus on human recognition and behavior – emerging topics in this domain – including socially responsible investment, customer choice, and the routing of electric vehicles. The last five papers propose new methods or technologies of environmentally conscious design and sustainable manufacturing, including ecobusiness design, electric vehicle heating systems, and the sustainability evaluation of manufacturing processes. Some papers, revised and extended in response to the editor’s invitations, were originally presented at EcoDesign 2013: 8th International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing (Jeju, Korea). The editor sincerely thanks the authors and reviewers for their devoted work in making this special issue possible. We hope that these articles will encourage further research on design and manufacturing for environmental sustainability.

Environment Conscious Design in the Mabechi-gawa National Irrigation Project

Environment Conscious Design in the Mabechi-gawa National Irrigation Project

Recent Trends of the Laws and Regulations about Environment, and Environmental Activities in the Electric Wire and Cable Industry

In this paper, I will explain recent trends of the laws and regulations about environment. Furthermore, I will describe the environmental activities in the electric wire and cable industry such as material recycling, promotion of environmental conscious design, and so on.

Environment-conscious Design in the Chushindaira National Irrigation and Drainage Project

Environment-conscious Design in the Chushindaira National Irrigation and Drainage Project

Environmental conscious product design using CAD and CAE

Environmental consciousness has been regarded as an important concept for survival in the contemporary scenario. Modern design engineers are in need of approaches for creating environmentally friendlier products. In this context, this article reports a case study carried out in an Indian rotary switches manufacturing organization. The existing components of rotary switch have been modelled using computer-aided design (CAD). Then, the sustainability analysis has been carried out for determining the environmental impact. This is followed by the optimisation of the components using computer-aided engineering (CAE). The environmental impact has been measured in terms of carbon footprint, energy consumption and air/water impacts. It has been found that the optimized components possess minimal environmental impact. The sustainability improvement after the implementation of the proposed approach has been computed. It could be inferred from the results of the case study that CAD and CAE could lead to the development of environmental conscious product designs with minimal impact to the environment.

Multi-criteria decision making and uncertainty analysis for materials selection in environmentally conscious design

Around the globe, manufacturers are increasingly trying to design products that are as ecological as possible, which is leading to the establishment of new design methods focused on environmentally conscious design (ECD). Materials selection, as a key element in ECD, differs from traditional design by introducing three additional requirements: life cycle viewpoint, consideration on environmental impact and cost, and uncertainties in the product life cycle scenario. This paper presents a new multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) model and uncertainty analysis method for the environmentally conscious materials selection problem. The model is based on engineering analysis and life cycle simulation, and is constructed in such a way so that it contains uncertainties to be explored and may be executed during product design; it considers such issues as manufacturing and post-use processes such as recycling. The TOPSIS method is employed, and uncertainty analyses are performed for model flexibility. The model is applied to material selection for PC housing. The case study shows that the decision-making analysis can provide useful design guidelines and a criterion for materials selection to achieve Environmentally Conscious Design.

Environment-conscious Design in Osaki National Irrigation and Drainage

Environment-conscious Design in Osaki National Irrigation and Drainage

Current Status of Environmentally Conscious Design Among Japanese Manufacturers

The importance of the environmentally conscious design (ECD) continues to increase because the approach enterprises take to environmental protection is shifting from environmental considerations in the factory to the development of environmentally conscious products (ECP). It is important that excellent practices concerning ECD processes be introduced into companies that have been slow to respond and that common problems with ECD processes be identified. To these ends, our survey research team investigated the current status of ECD among Japanese manufacturers through interviews and mail-in surveys. In this paper, we first describe our survey results on the current status of ECD in each industrial sector. Secondly, we propose an ideal ECD scheme for implementation in companies.