Characteristics on eco-design and the practical guidelines on how to design your products in line with sustainability.

1. Ecodesign to be prosumer
Giulia Ferrari

2. Why
Ecodesign?
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3. Our goal
The territory is inhabited by us,
so we know exactly what that needs.
To be PROSUMERS: aware of our choices and
responsible towards environment.
To educate to critical thinking,
not just let us live, but to live.
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4. CONTENT
1. Introduction
2. Concurrent (or Simultaneous) Ecodesign
3. Guidelines of Ecodesign
4. Let’s be prosumer since now!
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5. Introduction
5
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6. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
• 1987, United Nations, Brundtland Commission:
development that "meets the needs of the
present without compromising the ability of
future generations to meet their own needs.”
• 2011, Michael Thomas Needham: "as the
ability to meet the needs of the present while
contributing to the future generations’
needs.“ (There is an additional focus on the present
generations' responsibility to improve the future
generations' life).
wikipedia.com credits: Getty Images

7. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Scheme
wikipedia.com credits: Getty Images

8. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Scheme
Systemic vision: economy exists inside the society
and both exist in the natural environment.
Economy
Society
Environment defined
territory
(local) credits: Getty Images

9. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
The Three E’s Balance Rule
“The Three E’s”: Equity, Economy and Ecology.
(Agenda 21*)
• Equity: to take joint action, encouraged by consultation
among the various levels of government, to ensure
conditions for human well-being (safety, health, education)
for all the people in the world.
• Economy: to produce and maintain the maximum added
value within the territory, first exploiting actual resources.
• Ecology: to enhance and protect the environment as a
"distinctive element" of the territory.
*Agenda 21 is an action agenda for the United Nations , other multilateral
organizations, and individual governments, with regards to sustainable
development, product of the UN Conference on Environment and
Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992.
wikipedia.com credits: Getty Images

10. Concurrent
Ecodesign
10
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11. CUNCURRENT ECODESIGN (CED)
(L. Bistagnino, C. Lanzavecchia, G. F. Micheletti)
• Design methodology
• Includes the Cuncurrent Engineering
(design of single products in a “eco way”)
• Organizational tool to deal with the
management of complexity
• Goal: to pursue the sustainable
development in a broad sense
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12. CUNCURRENT ECODESIGN (CED)
(L. Bistagnino, C. Lanzavecchia, G. F. Micheletti)
Ecodesign Guidelines
Fuzzy Logic
Data Banks (“Smart” products)
Analyses of Value
Eco-Softwares Time to Market Standards Eco-Standards
Functional
analyses
Strategic
MIPS Production Concept
(Material Intensity
Design
per Unit Service)
Softwares DESIGN PROCESS Just in Time
Industrial
Design and
Development Symbiosis
engineering
(inputs/outputs
Digital
Workshops Total Quality exchange)
co-creation
(Cradle to Cradle) Digital co-creation Design
of Services
CUNCURRENT ENGINEERING
Ecolabel Ecoaudit
CUNCURRENT ECODESIGN
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13. Guidelines
of
Ecodesign
13
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14. GUIDELINES OF ECODESIGN
• Ecodesign regards all the life cycle of a product, from
“Cradle to Cradle” (Michael Braungart, Bill McDonough),
from
raw materials
to production
to waste management
to reintroduction of waste as raw material.
product/+service
Cradle
waste to resource
• We have to go beyond the appearance and
understand its whole life cycle: a green product
is not only that made of recycled or
recyclable materials!
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15. GUIDELINES OF ECODESIGN
1. Precycling: avoid the production of waste upstream.
2. “Cradle to cradle” design.
3. Evaluation of the environmental impact of the
product before its production.
4. Design for reduction: avoid oversize, reduce
thicknesses and quantity of material, dematerialization,
integrate more functions.
5. Optimization of energy consumption (in production and
use).
C. Lanzavecchia, Il fare ecologico, Time&Mind Edizioni, Torino 2004
credits: Getty Images

16. GUIDELINES OF ECODESIGN
6. Green technologies.
7. Avoid glues and varnished with chemicals (maybe
replace with joints).
8. Reduce non-renewable resources and prefer
renewable resources in short cycle (results of seasonal
harvests).
9. Reduce materials with an heavy “rucksack” (amount
of material taken from the environment for the production, use and
disposal of a product).
10. Use of recycled materials or, if not possible, of
recyclable materials (and facilitate their transport and
recycle).
C. Lanzavecchia, Il fare ecologico, Time&Mind Edizioni, Torino 2004
credits: Getty Images

17. GUIDELINES OF ECODESIGN
11. Create production and consumption systems,
respecting biodiversity, local cultures and human
rights.
12. Industrial symbiosis: integrated factories (zero
waste, zero emissions).
13. Reduce water consumption (in production and use). and
use non-potable water for industrial uses.
14. Design packaging in parallel to product (to avoid
further environmental costs in logistics).
15. Minimize transport consumption.
C. Lanzavecchia, Il fare ecologico, Time&Mind Edizioni, Torino 2004
credits: Getty Images

18. GUIDELINES OF ECODESIGN
16. Replace products with corresponding services.
17. Minimize noises increasing less possible the
quantity of insulating material.
18. Equal lifetime of components or partially
replacement of them (maintenance and upgrade).
19. Modularity and standardization.
20. Mark materials and reuse “in cascade”
(e.g.: in a car from the bumper to the dashboard to mats)
C. Lanzavecchia, Il fare ecologico, Time&Mind Edizioni, Torino 2004
credits: Getty Images

19. GUIDELINES OF ECODESIGN
21. Long-life items, unless they are subjected to
considerable technological upgrade and improvement
towards sustainability.
22. Use a single material or compatible materials
families or reduce the coexistence of different
materials (screws and nails included).
23. Design for Assembly and Disassembly (if the previous
is not possible).
24. Design for Components.
C. Lanzavecchia, Il fare ecologico, Time&Mind Edizioni, Torino 2004
credits: Getty Images

20. Let’s be
prosumer
since now!
20
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21. GREEN PRODUCTS ARE
REALLY ECODESIGNED?
• Check books on green design
products and reflect if they apply
actually Ecodesign guidelines.
• Remember: not all products,
which the market tell us are eco,
are actually like that! The market
lives of marketing and exploits
values and ideas it wants
through communication!
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22. SOME PRODUCTS ARE
ECODESIGNED…NOT
INTENTIONALLY!
• Surf the web to find 2
products which apply one or
more guidelines of
Ecodesign (possibly different
guidelines).
• Underline CED guidelines.
• Remember: be critical!
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23. …and remember:
not just let us live, but to live.
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