Design for sustainability

In the last years, new standards (e.g., the EN4555X series) and indices (i.e., RSS, eDiM,) have been published to include repairability aspects in product design. These indices are very useful in the design phase to characterize the product and to understand the ability of products to be repaired, reused, upgraded, and recycled. However, the way how these indices have been developed presents some issues that can lead to a wrong assessment/evaluation and result interpretation. This work analyses the main shortcomings encountered in the assessment of the disassembly index in the RSS score providing useful guidelines to improve them. The study has been carried out based on a set of laboratory tests and results analysis performed on cooking appliances (e.g., ovens, hobs, hoods). Nine issues related to the disassembly index have been highlighted including a focus on the impacted parameters. The work provides a useful base to enhance the studies related to product disassembly for repairability as well as to update the standard related to repairability and to make use of this index in the early phase of product design.

Keywords: Circular Economy , Cooking appliances , Design for Disassembly , Design for Repairability , Ease of repair , Repairability Index

The challenges of sustainable development require a consistent transformation of decision-making practices in society and in the industry. In this regard, Virtual Reality (VR) is an effective tool, providing experiences that are not accessible in the real world. The overview effect is a feeling of interconnectedness and responsibility towards our planet and its inhabitants described by astronauts after seeing the Earth during spaceflights. We present a VR application merging the overview effect with data visualization. We illustrate the design process and perform a pilot test to assess the emotions raised by the VR experience. Furthermore, we report feedback from design engineering and sustainability experts discussing the applications' potential in decision-making contexts, including product development processes.

Keywords: Decision making , Emotional design , Human behaviour in design , Sustainability , Virtual reality

Academic institutions are increasingly required to prepare future practitioners to face complex sustainability challenges. The need to foster the development of different skills, attitudes, and multidisciplinary collaboration raised the interest in alternative learning approaches. Game-based learning can be a tool to achieve a variety of desirable learning outcomes, including sustainability and collaborative attitudes change. We present a pilot study investigating the potential of a board game on sustainability risks and opportunities in product development and life cycle, performing a test with different student audiences. The paper discusses our results of the experiment, including a survey following the game, qualitative analysis of students' feedback, and observations during the game sessions. Additionally, we relate insights from students' reflections to CDIO learning objectives. We then illustrate lessons learned and the potential advantages of using the game compared to other teaching approaches and as a complementary tool. Finally, we propose future directions and recommendations for the use of the board game and game-based learning in sustainability education with different student audiences.

Keywords: Early design phases , Education , Game Based Learning , Serious Game , Sustainability

This paper provides a critical overview of Design for Sustainability (DfS) and Design for Well-Being practices as, today, sustainability, human behavior, and well-being are inextricably linked. We present a case study in response to a pharmaceutical company brief about cosmetic self-production packaging. Since the research takes place during the first lockdown due to Covid-19, it depicts quite a complex and extensive desk phase and a limited field phase. The research is approached on two levels. First, is the intention to change the way we interact with the packaging. As a container of elements, packaging can be a resource on all levels, not only because we can recycle it but also because we can replant it. In this way, we would return part of what had been taken away to the environment while also improving the product's life cycle. Thus, packaging becomes “behavioral”, producing and stimulating conscious behavior and motivating end-users while also educating them about environmental norms. Second, the Critical Design method traces the connections between DfS and Design for Well-being by leveraging the two practices within product design, clarifying the role of the designer in this transdisciplinary integration.

Keywords: Behavioral Packaging , Design for Sustainability , Design for Well-being , DIY , Industrial Design , Product Design

In the contemporary automobile scene, environmental effect abatement is being increasingly sought; this demands a full rethinking of the entire system and entails more than just the reduction in exhaust pollutant emissions. Currently, the most popular approach is the electrification of automobiles, which significantly reduces pollution in major urban areas while simultaneously posing a new set of problems. The two types of zero-emission vehicles that are now being developed the most are hydrogen fuel cells and battery electric cars, but another option is the Hydrogen Internal Combustion Engine (HYICE) engine, which is highly advantageous in terms of pollutants, aside from Nitrogen Oxides (NOx), which can be considerably decreased. The purpose of this study is to develop a novel vehicle design that transports this type of technology into a sporting context while striving for considerable environmental benefits and integrating them into a society where the love of automobiles still has a strong following. The cutting-edge Industrial Design Structure (IDeS) methodology is used in this work, and a sample structure was created to demonstrate how the problems and technical limitations represented can be solved. The steps of the methodology are followed to shape the final product, with careful consideration given to the design of the styling component through the use of the Stylistic Design Engineering (SDE) method. With the ultimate goal of achieving sustainable driving pleasure, the study looks into whether recyclable materials can be used for the body and whether extremely light materials can be used for the chassis.

Keywords: car design , future mobility , HYICE engine , IDeS methodology , recyclable materials

Modern industries are experiencing radical changes due to the introduction of high technological innovations. In this context, even more highly complex and customized products are required, increasing the need of tending towards the concept of complexity for free. In addition, new products are conceived with the circular economy in mind, considering possible multi life-cycle at the early design stage to reduce time and costs while ensuring high quality standards. To evaluate the overall product complexity, this research combines geometrical, manufacturing, assembly, and disassembly complexity features, typically treated separately in the literature. The research is divided into two parts and proposes a novel methodological framework for assessing product complexity with an overall view, integrating many aspects of product life cycle. The framework aims to create a rank of product configurations, on the base of complexity. Making complexity assessment procedures objective is essential to effectively support decision-making processes, especially when introducing advanced manufacturing technologies such as Additive Manufacturing (AM). Additionally, it is necessary to know the complexity of the individual components before the overall assembly. This paper deals with the first part of the research, proposing the aforementioned novel methodological framework, with a great focus on geometrical complexity. A geometrical complexity index is defined through experimental and numerical surveys, involving CAD modeling experts and considering numerous metrics found in the technical literature. The proposed methodological framework and the geometrical complexity metric can provide useful tools for businesses looking to evaluate their product complexity and identify areas for improvement.

Keywords: CAD , Geometrical complexity , Methodological framework , Product complexity , Survey

Composite materials use recently increased, although treatments at their End of Life are inexistent or highly inefficient (from the environmental perspective). Thus, openness to cooperation is needed, supported by methodologies for design for de-manufacturing. The approach proposed in the present work aims at transforming industrial processes' scraps and off-specification pieces in primary materials, through re-design, without the risk of cannibalisation. It is mainly intended for industrial processes of composite materials; its objective is to find alternative applications to their invaluable final disposal and supports the merging of existing supply chains (Industrial Symbiosis). Nevertheless, it can be easily extended to non-composite and/or non-scraps. Re-design enables the establishment of waste-to-treasure composite scraps' life cycles and is evaluated through Life Cycle Assessment. The application of the approach involved four Italian companies and results reveal that industrial symbiosis can reduce emissions (from −45% to more than −90%). Guidelines were outlined: involve End of Life operators to know how waste treatments, share information, favour networking and proximity, apply design for disassembly principles, consider simple shapes and modularity during (re)design. Future works will focus on off-the-shelf components and the economic evaluation of the proposed de-manufacturing actions and supply strategies.

Keywords: Circular economy , composite materials , design for de-manufacturing , eco-design , EoL awareness , industrial symbiosis

The Life Cycle Assessment is a well-stated methodology whose application has recently spread over a multitude of sectors. Thus the need for very accurate and reliable analysis. The present work investigates how to achieve reliable and faithful results while still maintaining a micro-systemic approach and how to handle the evolution of the real cases through commercial solutions available. The works present an innovative dynamic approach that aims at filling the discrepancy between the attributional Life Cycle Assessment which is focused on the product at the point to appear short-sighted and isolated from the surrounding evolving system and the consequential, which is willing to include the consequences of the evolution of the surrounding system, with increased complexity. The approach is applied to the case of a domestic refrigerator; the application reveals a discrepancy of 16% between the results of the dynamic and attributional analysis and registered doubled environmental impacts than the consequential, carried out with the support of commercial datasets. The approach respects the 5 main criteria for methods in environmental systems analysis, namely feasibility, accuracy, easiness in communication, inspiration, robustness.

Keywords: Ecodesign , Product modelling / models , Research methodologies and methods , Sustainability

The extension of the product lifecycle is crucial in the application of Circular Economy principles. However, when Energy Related Products are concerned, managing a durable product does not necessarily mean dealing with sustainable products. This happens because components and/or materials are affected by aging and lead to increased requirement of resources to run (i.e. electricity); there are certain trends that, although distinct from the previous facts, balance the effects of aging, i.e. energy grid mix decarbonization. In the present work an approach that considers both the economic and environmental consequences of durable products is proposed. The Durabot tool has been developed to accomplish the environmental analysis. The work overcomes the main literature criticalities: enables the assessment of environmental consequences of durability; the evolution of energy grid mix is introduced; the environmental consequences of durable products in different lifecycle scenarios can be assessed during the design phase; therefore, the components to substitute and to make accessible are identified. The tool is intended to be used aiming at design for product lifecycle extension, maintaining both economic and environmental convenience

Keywords: Decision making , Design to X , Research methodologies and methods , Sustainability

Environmental sustainability represents an unavoidable design driver. The consciousness of the importance of tackle the topic of environmental sustainability since the first stages of the product lifecycle is slowly spreading through enterprises. However, although they reach this grade of awareness, it is hard to introduce additional considerations to the traditional drivers of functionality, manufacturability, assembly, cost, etc. Therefore, it is crucial to identify methods and tools to support companies in efficiently integrating environmental sustainability issues in their design process. This paper proposes an approach to identify the inputs, functionality and outputs suitable to each industrial reality. Its core is the eco-design tool matrix, that estimates the tool implementation time and suggests proper outputs; from this the necessary inputs and functional blocks are derived. The approach is applied to the cases of two Italian industries, very different one another. This proves the wide applicability of the approach. The definition of a validation procedure represents the next steps to identify the benefits of the approach.

Keywords: Design management , Design methodology , Design process , Ecodesign

Sustainability and durability are not always synonyms when related to Energy Related Products. Europe has set goals to reduce the environmental impact due to the production of electricity. This paper accomplishes needs to investigate whether using a durable product for many years is more convenient, from an environmental perspective, than substituting the good with a new one. It assesses the environmental sustainability of durable products, taking the case of two single-door freestanding refrigerators used in Europe. In doing so the change in the composition of sources used in the production of electricity is considered. This is then compared with durability results, assuming the yearly energy consumption to be stable over time. The results highlight that introducing additional parameters that describe more accurately the real case can help in drafting a more precise description of reality, even though makes the use of full indexes mandatory. Water use and Mineral Resource Scarcity indicators there are clear trends, whose common thread is the use of simplified or extended durability index formula. The reduction of fossils and the decreased impact related to the consumption of energy make the weight of production and disposal phases heavier in the lifecycle impact distribution and increase the positive contribution of the durability index (PPnn + EEnn). For Global Warming Potential impact category (for which use phase retains at least 80% of the environmental impacts) there isn't any clear trend: it urges to describe energy grid mix variations or other factors according to realistic parameters. Future works should consider the consequences of the energy mix due to the geopolitical criticalities Europe is facing and introduce additional parameters that describe how the product performance change over time.

Keywords: Durability , energy mix composition , Energy Related Products , energy transition , environmental assessment

In the present global health emergency, face masks, gowns, caps, gloves play a key role in limiting the diffusion of the COVID-19 pandemic, by acting as physical barriers to avoid droplets and filtrate exhalations coming from infected subjects. Since the most widespread devices are disposable products made of plastic or rubber materials, this means that relevant quantities of fossil resources are consumed, and huge amounts of wastes are generated. Currently the end of life of personal protective equipment (PPE) represents a problem in environmental, economic, and social terms. The market considers two possible disposal scenarios: incineration with energy recovery or landfill. In both cases, significant impacts are achieved both on the environment and on human health. This study aims to propose and validate a new scenario for PPE based on material reuse for bituminous conglomerates. The Life Cycle Assessment methodology and the experimental tests has been used to assess the environmental impacts in terms of both ReCiPe midpoints and endpoints and for demonstrate the technical feasibility of this new scenario. From an environmental point of view, relevant benefits were observed in comparison with the standard incineration for energy recovery or disposal in landfill.

Keywords: Circula Economy , DPI , Enviromental impact , Reuse

The recent increase of interest in manufacturing techniques using metal powders, including additive manufacturing (AM), metal injection moulding (MIM) and hot isostatic pressing (HIP), has made methods for manufacturing alloyed metal powders especially iron-, nickel and cobalt-based alloys, a topic of much increased importance. The ‘classical' PM sintered parts business did not attract much research interest, but the last twenty years have seen first, the advent of MIM and HIP and, more recently, AM or three-dimensional (3D) printing. These newer branches of PM make quite different demands on the metal powders that they employ. Metal powders can be produced by a range of techniques including solid-state reduction, electrolysis, atomization, chemical processes, and mechanical comminution. Among these methods, atomization and solid-state reduction are the most popular methods. Metal atomization powder production typically includes three steps: melting the raw materials, atomizing the intermediate products, and solidifying the resulting metallic powders. Although additive techniques are generally sustainable, the production of powders must be studied carefully. In this paper, the Life Cycle Assessment methodology has been used to assess the environmental impacts of titanium powder production in terms of both ReCiPe midpoints and endpoints. Then some solutions to minimize the environmental production impacts have been extracted from patents, following a systematic procedure, and have been reported and qualitatively assessed.

Keywords: Life Cycle Assessment , Metal powered , Patent analisys , Prospective LCA

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, global personal protective equipment (PPE) volume production and demand increased by 300-400% between 2019 and 2021. In this scenario, the present study aims to propose and validate an innovative circular economy scenario for end of life (EoL) PPEs, reusing them to produce reinforced bituminous mixtures. Despite that several studies confirmed the possibility of reusing plastic in the asphalt mixtures, none of them investigated the potential of PPEs, highlighting the innovativeness in the scientific panorama. Five different alternatives of EoL PPE mixtures (different products, materials, dosages, etc.) were tested at laboratory scale to verify the technical feasibility of the proposed scenario. The most promising solution resulted to be the mix of gloves and face masks composed by polypropylene, polyethylene, nitrile and lattice at a dosage of 0, 5% weight/weight that allowed to produce bituminous mixtures with acceptable performances in terms of relevant mechanical parameters while recycling waste PPEs. This leads to environmental benefits, since more than 3kg of EoL PPEs per square meter of road pavement can be reused instead of disposed (about 1, 5 million tons/year considering the bituminous mixtures produced at European level), as well as economic benefits for public administrations and the collectivity, due to the reduced landfilling of solid wastes.

Keywords: Circular economy , Personal protective equipment , Reinforced asphalt , Reuse

This research explores the importance of sustainability in the ceramic industry, focusing on how companies measure and monitor their sustainability indicators. Economic crises and climate change have led scholars over the years to focus their attention on reducing impacts and monitoring sustainability indicators with particular attention to the energy sphere. In the scientific literature it emerges that there is no set of indicators for the ceramic industries suitable for monitoring company data. To address this emerging gap, the paper takes a ceramic company as a reference and proposes a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) to help manufacturing companies monitor their economic, environmental, and social sustainability performance. The study aims to fill these gaps by underlining the importance of investing in the digitization of processes and in Industry 4.0 digital technologies to obtain constantly updated and real-time information for sustainability monitoring. The research also emphasizes the applicability of these findings to other manufacturing enterprises, offering a methodology for self-monitoring sustainability. The article suggests the development of a “Sustainability Digital Twin” as a tool to help business managers make informed decisions and design products with all aspects of sustainability in mind. The integration of sustainability and digitization is highlighted as a crucial aspect for achieving sustainable ceramic production. The proposed KPIs and the digitization of processes can provide data to implement strategic plans for sustainable production. Therefore, this study has contributed to fill the gaps in the literature by demonstrating that the digitization of production processes allows for a more specific assessment of economic, social and environmental impacts by ensuring transparent communication of performance to stakeholders.

Keywords: Ceramic industry , Data monitoring , Digital technology , Industry 4.0 , Key performance indicator , Sustainability

Nowadays, the social dimension of product sustainability is increasingly in demand, however, industrial designers struggle to pursue it much more than the environmental or economic one due to their unfamiliarity in correlating design choices with social impacts. In addition, this gap is not filled even by the supporting methods that have been conceived to only support specific areas of application. To fill this gap, this study proposed a method to support social failure mode and effect analysis (SFMEA), though the automatic failure determination, based on the use of a chatbot (i.e., an artificial intelligence (AI)-based chat). The method consists of 84 specific questions to ask the chatbot, resulting from the combination of known failures and social failures, elements from design theories, and syntactic structures. The starting hypothesis to be verified is that a GPT Chat (i.e., a common AI-based chat), properly queried, can provide all the main elements for the automatic compilation of a SFMEA (i.e., to determine the social failures). To do this, the proposed questions were tested in three case studies to extract all the failures and elements that express predefined SFMEA scenarios: a coffee cup provoking gender discrimination, a COVID mask denying a human right, and a thermometer undermining the cultural heritage of a community. The obtained results confirmed the starting hypothesis by showing the strengths and weaknesses of the obtained answers in relation to the following factors: the number and type of inputs (i.e., the failures) provided in the questions; the lexicon used in the question, favoring the use of technical terms derived from design theories and social sustainability taxonomies; the type of the problem. Through this test, the proposed method proved its ability to support the social sustainable design of different products and in different ways. However, a dutiful recommendation instead concerns the tool (i.e., the chatbot) due to its filters that limit some answers in which the designer tries to voluntarily hypothesize failures to explore their social consequences.

Keywords: artificial intelligence , chatbot , social FMEA , social sustainability

Digital technologies play a critical role in enhancing the safety operations, quality, and time management of projects. The building industry has been slower than other sectors to implement digital technologies. On the other hand, life cycle thinking, and sustainable awareness have become increasingly significant concepts. This literature-based research investigates the diffusion of digital technologies in the building sector in the context of their relationship with life cycle assessment (LCA) and other environmental assessment methods. The study examines an extensive database of 800 scientific documents. The findings reveal that Building Information Modelling (BIM) and 3D printing are the most diffused technologies used in conjunction with supporting the environmental assessment or evaluating the impact of the technologies in sustainability-related terms. Despite their expectedly large utilization in the building sector, the application and evaluation of some digital technologies are rarely reported. The study reveals that the end-of-life stage of buildings is associated with the smallest amount of evaluation examples in the examined papers. The integration of the life cycle thinking into approaches foreseeing the use of these technologies can provide significant advantages in terms of separation, recycling and disposal roots for the construction and demolition waste.

Keywords: Building industry , Digital technologies , Sustainability assessment

The documentation, conservation, and preservation of underwater archaeological sites is conventionally performed by divers in shallow waters. However, when dealing with significant depths, the sites can be inaccessible for humans, presenting significant challenges and risks, making these activities hazardous. Recently, the use of robotic platform such as remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) allows to overcome the difficulty of such a harsh environment. Nevertheless, professional-grade ROVs employed for this purpose are expensive and specifically designed with integrated advanced sensor systems for data acquisition and navigation. In the context of the MSCA-RISE H2020 Technological Consortium TO develop sustainability of underwater Cultural heritage (TECTONIC) project, a solution consisting of an optical payload and an acoustic localization system for low-cost ROV, was defined in order to support ROV pilots during documentation and monitoring activities. The project aims to preserve underwater cultural heritage (UCH) encompassing the selection of a commercially available ROV and the definition of a customized hardware/software (HW/SW) architecture. After market research, a suitable commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) low-cost ROV was defined and used as the foundation for integration. Mechanical, electric, and data interface modules were designed to seamlessly integrate and manage the sensor suite. The results of the integration demonstrate the potential of the chosen algorithms and the sensor suite for improved navigation and data collection in challenging underwater environments, where high-grade and expensive sensors are not available, thereby making more accessible the field of underwater survey missions.

Keywords: Underwater 3D Reconstruction , Underwater Cultural Heritage (UCH) , Underwater Localization , Underwater Mapping , Underwater Survey

Worldwide, life expectancy has steadily increased over the years. However, the integrity and the functionality of physiological systems reduce over time making older people more vulnerable to adverse events such as falls. Consequences of falls can include physical injuries (hip fractures), psychological issues (fear of falling) and social isolation (need for assistance) increasing the demand for healthcare services (hospitalization, rehabilitation, institutionalization). Despite many studies investigated the most predisposing factors to a fall risk, this study aimed at identifying those factors through a multidimensional health assessment of elderly people crossing over multiple health domains such as nutritional, clinical, psychological, social, and functional. The acquired variables were processed in terms of data cleaning and coding, to make them ready for subsequent statistical evaluation. Correlation and regression analyses were performed to find out the relevance of the variables with respect to the fall event. The most significant variables were accounted for the development of the predictive index. Each predictor was associated with a score according to specific weights so that the sum of the answers to each question of the index gave the final fall risk index. Its validation was assessed over the sample of the study by comparing the index output to that of the multidimensional evaluation and the one of a common fall risk test. Clinicians will benefit from this tool for a fast and easy screening of fall risk among community-dwelling seniors to act promptly on those subjects at increased risk, and preventively on low-risk subjects. This way, it is possible to optimize time, costs, and resources for sustainable and effective management of patient care.

Keywords: Data-driven approach , Fall-risk detection , Older adults , Predictive algorithm , Risk assessment , Risk prediction

Automated Shuttle buses (ASB) are considered an essential and sustainable direction for the future application of autonomous driving technology in public transportation. As the driver's role gradually decreases and disappears, the Human–Machine Interface (HMI) for information exchange and communication between users and ASB takes a more prominent role and progressively becomes a hotspot in research. However, the unpredictability and complexity of autonomous driving, an exceptionally fast-growing technology, have hindered its future study. This work first reviewed related literature in three categories: internal, external, and station of the ASB. Secondly, the importance of systemic and speculative design is affirmed by exploring existing HMI designs for ASB. Thirdly, the concepts for ASB resulting from three parallel workshops were analyzed. Finally, online questionnaires and interviews completed the critical reflection and discussion. The results show that the introduction of tools and methods related to systemic and speculative design into the design process of the HMI for ASB may help designers to think critically about the future uncertainty of ASB and to deal with the complexity of the system.

Keywords: automated shuttle buses , human-machine interface , speculative design , systemic design , user experience