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Chapter 2 Design Prez Notes (2.2: Waste Mitigation Strategies (Dfm…
Chapter 2 Design Prez Notes
2.1: Resources & Reserves
Renewable Resources
: Resources that can be replaced faster than they are consumed (e.g. geothermal power). Some of these are inexhaustible, meaning they cannot 'end' (solar, wind, tidal energy)
Non-renewable Resources
: finite resources, that are consumed faster than they are replaced (e.g. fossil fuels, iron, coal)
Reserves
: portions of resources can be legally recovered. These can be divided into:
Proven reserves (which can be easily recovered in the present day)
and Probable reserves (which could be recovered, somehow)
Multinational companies have a big impact on reserves and resources. The biggest companies utilise a lot of resources, most of which are non-renewable, which poses threats for them and the environment.
Research Development: When research is used to find good ways to use limited resources as well as saving up on them and finding alternatives.
Quality of Renewability
: how much something is likely to be renewed, and whether or not it's advantageous (usually applied to natural resources)
Recycling
: utilising materials inside products at the end of their life cycle in new ways (using plastic from bottles to build other plastic objects)
2.3: Energy Utilisation, Storage & Distribution
Embodied Energy
: the energy associated with a product throughout its life cycle, from its birth to its 'death'. Assessed in megajoules (mj/kg). Typically, the higher the energy and CO2 release, the more harmful it is. If you company is aiming to be environmentally friendly, your resources should release as little negative energy as possible
Changing materials and/or remodelling can be expensive, but if your company's goals include being environmentally sensitive it's something to be taken into consideration.
'Cradle To Grave'
: a way of describing a product's life cycle in simple steps, from its inception to its death.
2.4 Clean Technology
Drivers for cleaning up manufacturing:
Can be divided into three groups: social, political and economic.
Communities expect manufacturing plants will not harm the environment or affect health and safety. This can influence decisions introducing clean technology. Most decisions are based on economic profitability.
Role of Legislation:
In recent years, governments have introduced stricter clean air and water legislation. Manufacturers are being led to new cleaner technologies. This has also led to more efficient processes and reduced pollution.
International targets for reducing pollution and waste:
In 2005, the Kyoto Protocol asked countries to agree to reduction in their greenhouse gas emissions, in order to combat Global Warming.
End of pipe technology:
represent the conventional approach to pollution reduction and involve the addition of technology at the end of the process to remove pollutants from the waste stream. It is cheaper to prevent any potential environmental damage and deal with these issues.
Incremental solutions:
Advantages
- exploitation of existing technologies, improvements to competitiveness, predictable development, low levels of uncertainty.
Disadvantages
- crowded mature marketplace, many competitors, potential market growth small
Radical solutions:
Advantages
- new technologies, high potential for market growth, creation of new industries and fewer companies.
Disadvantages
- high uncertainty of success, possibility of high market resistance, development unpredictable incorporating specific starts and stops.
System level solutions:
involve integration of governmental industrial, environmental and trade policies.
2.5 Green Design
Definition
: Products with a reduced effect on the environment, or even a positive one, for their life cycle, along with minimising impact upon the environment for its future (for example, making it easily biodegradable).
Process Streamlining, Product Optimisation, Parts Standardisation, Improvements in Reliability, Benchmarking Againt Competitors
are all parts of Incremental Design (aims to obtain incremental improvements through small changes in design)
Radical Design
: making fewer, bolder changes in design that put them situations of advantage (e.g.: Dyson cyclone technology for vacuums)
Eco-labelling
: rating environmentally friendly products to put them on show and give them a marketing advantage
Green design needs to be assessed in a proper timescale for it to be considered credible (e.g.: what the product would change for the environment in X years)
Europe is starting to make it more necessary for companies to recycle or reuse their unused scraps / water materials with taxes
Prevention Principle
: the concept of making the world, workplaces, the environment etc. safe before accidents happen, not after. (Eliminating, reducing threats, etc.)
Countries that agree to the principle need to undertake measures that'll avoid environmental harm
Design Objectives for green products
Increasing the serviceability of goods/services
Reducing the material and energy intensity of goods/services
Maximising sustainable use of renewable resources
Require certification for doing business in certain fields
Enhancing material durability
Extending product durability
Reduced toxic dispersion
Strategies for designing green products
Energy Efficiency
Dematerialisation
Reduced Waste
Systems Integrations
Disassembly
Recyclability & Repair
Longevity
Reduced Embodied Energy
2.6 Eco-design
'cradle to grave' and 'cradle to cradle' philosophy:
Life cycle analysis isa method to assess the environmental effects of goods or services.
Life Cycle Analysis (LCA):
is a tool to support decision making for manufacturers when assessing the impact a product or process has on the environment.Helps companies become responsible for manufacturing based emissions and retrieving product waste.
LCA Stages:
the process can be broken down into four components. • Goal definition and scope - clearly specifying context, constraints and breadth of review process.
2.2: Waste Mitigation Strategies
Re-use:
repeated use of components or products employing the same or alternative purpose (eg. glass containers, plastic drink bottles, etc).
Repair:
relates to restoring a product or components to a good or sound working condition after deterioration or damage. Repairs may be functional or cosmetic eg. mending clothes, repairing damage to vehicle, etc. Increasingly the cost of repair of consumers products has become such that replacement is often cheaper.
Recondition:
used products that may be returned to their original manufactured specification or a close approximation to it. Aimed to extend products life until it is no longer commercially viable to continue. eg. reconditioned car engines, re-treaded car tires, etc
Re-engineer:
involves revision of an established design to achieve an improvement of some sort such as cost, performance, safety, manufacturability, quality, waste, reduction, usability, etc.
Pollution/Waste:
Most production processes create pollution and/or waste. eg. from transport, processing, manufacture and packing. Pollution and waste can come in many forms such as excess heat, exhaust gases, chemical discharge, product rejects and left over packaging.
Methodologies for waste reduction and designing out waste:
In order to move toward sustainable manufacturing designers are increasingly focusing on reducing waste that will otherwise find its way into landfills or as environmental pollution.
Methods of waste reduction:
• Product recovery/reuse
• avoid use of unnecessary packing
• produce to order, eliminate over supply
• production optimisation to reduce waste
• Material substitution that favours recycling
• use energy efficient equipment and lighting
• storage designed to reduce product deterioration
• quality assurance practices to reduce rejects based on poor quality
Dfm guidelines:
The efficient means of reducing waste is to address the problem at the design stage following design for manufacture (DfM) guidelines.
Design for process involves reductions in: the amount of energy consumed, number of production process employed, waste generated and emissions produced.
Design for assembly is an approach used by designers to analyse components and sub-assemblies with the goal of reducing costs through the reduction in the number of parts and maximising the efficiency of assembly processes.
Design for materials is a mechanism by which designers select appropriate materials with the aim of reducing toxic substances, hazardous waste, polluting emissions and the quantity of materials required.
Dematerialisation:
progressive reduction in the amount of energy and/or material used in the production of a product, and corresponds with the goal of waste minimisation. E.g increased efficiency led to the increased expansion of steam power. Economic and population growth strongly interact with many factors.
Product Recovery strategies at end-of-life/disposal:
Unwanted items have been buried in landfill or incinerated with little consideration given to reuse or recycling. This has serious impacts on the environment.
Landfill and industrial waste causes:
Risk of subsidence, Generation of odours, flammable and toxic gases, attraction of scavenging birds and vermin population, release of pollutants into the atmosphere in the event of a fire, pollution of surface and ground water.
Product "take-back":
reduce amount of hazardous wastes sent to landfill, increase availability of scrap, encourage design changes.
Collection methods:
drop-off, point-of-purchase, curb-side collection, combined/coordinated, permanent collection depot
Circular economy - the use of waste as a resource within a closed loop system:
refers to an economy based on the use of renewable sources of energy an the recycling of materials to create a sustainable economy. In this way the circular economy is intended to mimic the processes of a biological ecosystem as opposed to the currently prevailing relativity linear economic model in which non-renewable energy sources are used to crete products which at the end of their life are buried in landfill