Sustainable design The 6Rs Recycle • Materials that can be recycled – primary, secondary, tertiary • Products that use recycled materials • Disassembly- reprocessing materials for use in new products Reuse • Products that can be reused for either the same purpose or a new purpose • Products that can be adapted to suit an alternative use Reduce: • Life cycle of product(s)/Eco Footprint • Built in obsolescence • Energy and waste of production process • Materials – waste. Refuse: • Issues relating to sustainable design • Materials we should refuse to use. Rethink: • How it is possible to approach design problems differently • An existing product that has become waste, eg utilising materials or components for another purpose without processing it. Repair: • Products that can be repaired and consider issues of repair.

Recycle To develop your knowledge and understanding of: • what is meant by recycling; • primary, secondary and tertiary recycling; • how products are recycled. Recycling is the conversion of waste products into fresh materials. It is done primarily because there are not limitless resources of new materials. All new materials are sourced from the earth and the continued extraction of these causes environmental concerns. Also, everything we throw away goes somewhere – a product that is not recycled will end up in a rubbish dump, causing environmental problems. In primary recycling the products are simply used again, perhaps in a different context. Some companies specialise in buying used mobile phones for example, and these are sold on for use in countries such as China, Africa and India, helping to expand modern communications in these developing countries. Secondary (physical) recycling may involve shredding, crushing or grinding the product to produce a material which can be re-formed into another product. Tertiary (chemical) recycling makes use of chemicals to break down materials into simpler components which can then be re-formulated into new materials. This mainly applies to polymers (plastics). Remember that most products contain a range of different materials which need to be separated before the recycling process can take place.

Reuse To develop your knowledge and understanding of: • Reusing products or parts of products • Directives to cover the disposal of electrical products Some products are specifically designed to be reused. Plastic carrier bags or glass milk bottles, for example, often have a ‘please reuse me’ message printed on them. Shoe boxes or biscuit tins can be reused as storage boxes in our homes. Disposable cameras are designed with parts which can be reused in new cameras once the product has been handed in for processing – this saves the manufacturer money and has obvious benefits for the environment. Charity shops raise money by re-selling clothes and products which we do not want any more. By careful thought during the design stage, products can be made desirable or cost effective to reuse – refillable ink cartridges for printers are one example. Manufacturers and retailers of electrical products in Europe are now responsible for the collection, dismantling, recycling and disposal of used products under the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive. A manufacturer who has to fund the dismantling and recycling of their products will think more carefully about how to design the product to be more easily recyclable.

Reduce To develop your knowledge and understanding of: • ways in which designers can reduce the environmental impact of a product; • Life Cycle Assessment; • eco footprint; • planned obsolescence. Product designers should consider: • how a product can be made using less materials, or less range of materials; • how to use fewer parts in a product; • how to reduce the energy consumption associated with a product throughout its life. The Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of a product looks at the environmental impact a product has throughout all stages of its life: • Sourcing the raw materials • The production process • Transportation of materials and distribution of the product • The product in use • Disposal and recycling. The product’s eco footprint summarises the outcome of the LCA. A small eco footprint describes a product which causes minimal damage to the environment throughout all stages of its life cycle.

Reduce Some products are designed to last only a set period of time. The designer may have planned for the product to soon become out of fashion so that the purchaser feels pressured to buy a new one. Parts of the product may be designed to fail after a set time so that the product just be replaced, or the manufacturer may withhold certain features from a product and plan to release them later in an upgraded model. This is called planned obsolescence and some people think that manufacturers act immorally in doing this, although there is an argument that it encourages product development and stimulates commercial activity.

Refuse To develop your knowledge and understanding of: • ways to consider why consumers might refuse to buy some products. People might refuse to buy a product for some of the following reasons: • It may use an excessive amount of unsustainable materials • It may use materials which are poisonous or harmful to the environment • It may have been manufactured by people working in poor conditions with few human rights • It may have excessive packaging • It may have been unnecessarily transported over long distances • It may not be a healthy option product • It may not be easy to recycle at the end of its life • They do not really need the product • It may not function very well

Rethink To develop your knowledge and understanding of: • the need to rethink your own lifestyle and the impact it has on the world. Designers have a responsibility to design products that people need. But what about products that people want? In recent years, householders have been encouraged to replace incandescent light bulbs with low energy alternatives. However, legislation has now been passed to actually ban old fashioned light bulbs so that users are forced to buy low energy versions. Is this fair? Large electrical superstores compete with each other to source and sell goods at the lowest price. Should we buy the cheapest product without asking about its eco footprint or about the rights of the workers who made it? What are the implications of airlines offering low cost flights? Should we ask parents for a lift in the car, take the bus, or walk? We need to rethink the way in which we buy products and the way in which we use them.

Repair To develop your knowledge and understanding of: • the reasons why many modern products are not designed to be repaired; • how products can be designed for disassembly and repair; • common faults that occur which are easy to fix. It is said that we now live in a throw-away society. It is quicker, easier and often cheaper to throw something away rather than repair it. Unwanted electrical and electronic equipment is growing three times faster than any other type of waste. Why is it that modern electronic devices are hardly ever repaired if they go wrong? There are a number of reasons: • The circuits are very complex • The components are very small • Spare parts cannot be obtained • Opening the case can be quite a challenge • A new product is very cheap and the latest model looks so much better However complex a circuit is, many faults in electronic products are actually very easy to repair and are usually limited to dirty battery contacts, worn out switches, bad connections between plugs and sockets or cracked tracks and solder joints on PCBs. Most people would instantly throw away a mobile phone if they dropped it in water but, if they knew to immediately take out the battery and then leave the phone in a warm place to dry for a couple of days, it would probably still work fine.

Repair A little research on the internet will often provide useful repair information for popular products and links to suppliers for spare parts. With a little experience you might even be able to make yourself some money repairing faulty gadgets for family and friends.