Eco-Design: Aligning Sustainability & Innovation in Product Development
The demand for sustainable products is growing. Consumers, governments, investors and other business partners alike are looking to manufacturers to minimize their environmental impact. And they are not alone: regulatory authorities have established standards and laws pushing companies to become more transparent and more sustainable.
These new requirements create new challenges for manufacturers, who will need to invest and innovate. Both demand financial resources and additional effort, leading companies to question: How can we align sustainability and business objectives?
The answer lies with Eco-Design. By integrating sustainability throughout the product development cycle, this innovative approach unlocks the potential for sustainable design without compromising time-to-market or increasing costs. Let us see how.
Embracing Sustainability with Eco-Design
Eco-design is an approach that enables companies to take into account the environmental impact of the product right from the design phase. It does not stop there: the positive impact of this approach will ripple down throughout the entire product's lifecycle.
Indeed, from the design phase right through its end of life, eco-design supports various aspects including:
- Reducing resource consumption during processing and manufacturing,
- Increasing use more sustainable materials including recycled and recyclable materials,
- Improving product energy efficiency during use phase,
- Enhancing product durability by improving reparability and quality,
- Facilitating product disassembly at its end-of-life,
- Decreasing carbon emissions at every stage.
- Sustainability & Innovation Through Eco-Design
- Circular Design for a Waste-Free Future
Reach Sustainability Objectives, Meet Business Goals, Gain a Competitive Edge
With eco-design, companies are in a better position to meet market demands, align with existing sustainability goals, maximize environmental performance, and stay ahead of regulations.
But that’s not all. Beyond that, eco-design is a way for companies to stand out from the competition. Not only by bringing more sustainable products in the market, quickly and cost-effectively, but most importantly by fostering innovation.
Eco-Design and Circularity: Circular Design
Unlike the ‘take-make-waste’ linear model, the circular economy aims to eliminate waste and pollution, keep products and materials in use, regenerate natural systems. Of course, implementing circular economy principles comes with its challenges. Here, an eco-design approach can help. By designing products that minimize the use of raw materials, improve their energy efficiency, extend their lifespan and ensure their recyclability, we can see easily how eco-design and circularity are going in the same direction.
Empower eco-design with Lifecycle Assessment
If eco-design is an approach, life cycle assessment (LCA) is its most powerful tool.
LCA is a rigorous scientific method that systematically and objectively evaluate the environmental impact of a product design, from sourcing raw materials to end-of-life disposal or recycling. By combining both qualitative and quantitative criteria, LCA provides the holistic data, much needed by manufacturers, and thus empowers them to understand, analyze and then improve the environmental impact of a product.
Virtual twins: catalysts for sustainable innovation
LCA reaches new heights when combined to a virtual twin. This integration allows for better decision-making throughout the product development process, enabling companies to make more sustainable choices without incurring the costs of physical testing and iteration.
With LCA, you are now able to design and understand the product’s environmental impact at the same time. This means that you are able to change the design to be more sustainable, to choose the right alternative. This is a game changer for the industry.
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FAQ about Eco-Design
An eco-design approach is part of the broader notion of sustainable design. Eco-design considers the environmental impact of a product, a service or a process during its entire lifecycle. We usually consider that sustainable design will also consider social impacts.
The eco-design approach can be presented in six steps:
- Identification of the company’s objectives
- Perform of an environmental analysis in a reference product to set a baseline.
- Search for eco-design opportunities and evaluation of alternatives.
- Comparison of alternatives to support the final decision.
- Compare analysis between the reference product and the eco-design product to quantify reduction.
- Market launch
Eco-design can be implemented on new products or new versions of existing products.
Here are some eco-design examples:
- Phone maker can design a repairable smartphones designed to last as long as possible and where users can fix parts themselves;
- The paperboard manufacturers can take advantage of digital solutions to innovate and develop new packaging designs that use less material. Other packaging companies aim to develop alternative materials.
- Car manufacturers can look for ways to use less primary raw materials and integrate more sustainable materials within their design.
- Home appliances and consumer goods are under scrutiny when it comes to energy efficiency. Manufacturers can significantly reduce the impact of their products during use phase by, for example, designing products that use minimal power when idle.
It has now become common knowledge that decisions made during the design stage can influence a product’s environmental impact by up to 80%. With that in mind, we can easily understand its importance: eco-design is a powerful approach that designers and engineers can leverage to minimize negative impact on the environment.
The first step would be to choose a reference product, usually one of the best-selling products, and asses the environmental impact of this product. The goal is to identify where are the biggest impacts on the environment occurs and understand the reason behind these major impacts.
The second step is to search and find eco-design alternatives for the reference product. It can be upstream transportation closer to the manufacturing site, improve the manufacturing process to produce less waste, integrate some recyclable materials, reduce the weight of the product.
The last and most important step is to set up best practices, using the learnings on the best-seller product, to replicate to the rest of the portfolio of existing products or include in the development of new products.
Eco-design in building and architecture focuses on reducing the environmental impact of structures by incorporating sustainable materials, optimizing energy efficiency, and enhancing durability. It involves designing buildings that use fewer resources during construction, minimize energy consumption throughout their lifecycle, and facilitate easy recycling or repurposing of materials.
Eco-design and ecological design share common goals but differ in scope:
Eco-design focuses on reducing a product or a service environmental impact throughout its lifecycle, from creation to disposal, aiming for sustainability without sacrificing efficiency or cost-effectiveness.
Ecological design takes a more holistic view, integrating systems thinking and prioritizing harmony with natural ecosystems. It not only seeks to minimize environmental damage but also aims to regenerate ecosystems, often focusing on biodiversity and environmental health.