sustainability and technological innovation john r. ehrenfeld visiting professor design for...

Sustainability and Technological Innovation

John R. Ehrenfeld

Visiting Professor

Design for Sustainability Section

Technical University of Delft

IST Technology Management Program 2001 © John Ehrenfeld 2

Outline of presentation

The role of innovation and design in society Sustainability as a new and challenging social goal Strategies for sustainability Examples of innovation towards sustainability


What is Design?

Design is a deliberate intervention into cultural routines in order to solve a persistent problem or to realize a new future opportunity.

Design occurs outside of everyday routine activities. Design applies to all categories of cultural

structures. Designers who aim to create new structure for

sustainability will address today’s problems and tomorrow’s opportunities.

Designers must know why they do what they do.


Design Is Neither Engineering nor Analysis

Designers bring forth new forms out of possibility. Innovations are not limited by positive knowledge. New forms rest on metaphors drawn from the stories that

designers and artists tell about life and the world.

Engineers (and analysts) create predictions about the future. The future is based on and extends the past. Uncertainty creates [enormous] potential for unintended

consequences.

Engineers often act as designers, but not vice versa.


Models of Culture and Social Change

Standard Neo-classical Economic Positivist Paradigm The invisible hand aggregates individual free choice into a social

optimum. Scientific knowledge is the only form of “truth” and is

liberating. Technological change is always progressive.

Sociological Structuration Model Individual choice is constrained by societal structures. Knowledge is historical and contingent. There is no teleology or immanent progression of change. Change is dialectic in response to reflections of problems

and opportunities.


A Model of Action, Learning and Change

ReflexiveMonitoring

Tools

Commitments

Authority

Outcomes THE “REAL” World

Shared beliefs

OURWorld

NormativeRulesIntentions


Domains of Design

Shared beliefs Education (teachers)

Normative rules Legislation and regulatory policy (Politicians)

Authority Institutional (Planners and policy analysts) Organizational design (Consultants)

Tools Technological innovation (Industrial designers and

engineers)


A History of Shifting [Environmental] Frameworks

From media-based to organic and holistic From process-based to (life-cycle) product-based From pollution control to environmental

management to sustainable development From sustainable development to sustainability

The trend is towards a systems view tying together more actors and a broader social scope. New frameworks for policy and technology design are needed to match the increased complexity and breadth of the systems being managed.


What IS Sustainability?

Sustainability is a mere possibility that human and other life will flourish on the Earth forever. Flourishing means not only survival, but also the realization of whatever we humans declare makes life meaningful—justice, freedom, and dignity.


Foundations of Sustainable Frameworks

Rationalistic concepts (Out of past experience) Utilitarian, neo-economics Competitive markets Technological optimism Responsibility to nature and others for our actions

Humanistic concepts (What makes us humans) Collective flourishing - justice, equality... Individual flourishing - authentic satisfaction, dignity...

From having to being Naturalistic concepts (Our place within the ecosystem)

Limits/carrying capacity Evolutionary threats Nature as a sustainable metaphor


The New Sustainability Triad

Economic Equity

Environment

The Rio Version

Naturalistic

Rationalistic Humanistic

The New Version


Rationalistic Strategic Concepts

WCED (Brundtland) concept of sustainable development

Triple bottom line or win-win-win Resource productivity WBCSD concept of eco-efficiency (in part) Responsible sustainability (avoiding unintended

consequences of economic activity) Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) policies Precautionary Principle Information-based (eco-labeling)


Humanistic Strategic Concepts

Addressing collective needs Eco-justice and other calls for “equity”

Addressing individual needs Authentic satisfaction

Recapturing being from having Emancipation

Avoiding technological tyranny

Both categories are essential to create flourishing. The first is usually a matter of public policy. The second is the realm, in part, of designers of artifacts and technological systems


Naturalistic Strategic Concepts

Industry or sectoral strategies Eco-efficiency (in part) The Natural Step

4 principles

McDonough/Braungart design system Waste equals food

Lovins and Weiszacker Factor 4 reductions

Industrialized national policies Factor 4 to factor 20 (50?) reductions

Broad applicability Industrial Ecology

Nature as a metaphor for sustainability


Examples of “Design” for Sustainability

New beliefs Industrial ecology

New policies Extended producer responsibility

New tools Sustainable product/service systems

New authority structure Participative planning and product development


Extended Producer Responsibility

Shifts responsibility for environmental management to the dominant player in a product’s life cycle.

Primarily focused on take-back and recovery/recycling.

The manufacturer is usually the dominant player. First example is the German Waste Law (Packaging

ordinance) Innovative organizations have already emerged

Duale System Deutschland


Product service systems (PSS)…

Are systems of technological artifacts (products), information, financial arrangements, and other supporting infrastructure that fulfills customers’ demands over time. New? No! All products are embedded in a system that services

the customer/user. But new to those who have long thought they are in the product

business and have seen service as an auxiliary function. Consistent with current notions of an information or

functional society. Reflect growing focus on systems in sustainability

thinking.


Relation of PSS to Sustainability

Eco-efficient product [service] systems can result in significant dematerialization relative to conventional product systems. Strategies: dematerialization, product prolongation,

EPR, asset management Potential gains are offset by rebound effects.

Sustainable [product] service systems can impact the humanistic dimension and change patterns of demand permanently. Strategies: Product semantics and scripts, authentic

satisfaction, preference change, cultural change (structuration)


Selected Examples:Product/Service Systems

Xerox 265 Office Copiers Zero waste to landfill Asset management

GreenWheels car sharing system 25,000 users in the Netherlands

Interface Carpet Evergreen lease Solenium fully recyclable carpeting

MITKA bike vehicle Human-powered road alternative to autos

DuPont/Ford auto painting arrangement On-house contract painting service


Industrial Ecology is…

…the study of the flows of materials and energy in industrial and consumer activities, of the effects of these flows on the environment, and of the influences of economic, political, regulatory, and social factors of the flow, use and transformation of resources.

Robert White, President of the US Academy of Engineering


Industrial Ecology is also...

A multi-disciplinary, objective field of study focused on flows of energy and materials in industrial systems. Comprehensive system for accounting for material and

energy flows in an economic system Organizational concepts based on ecological systems.

A new regime for designing policy and socio-economic systems based on features of ecological systems. Products/service systems Industrial complexes and symbioses Urban structures Material and energy policies


The Ecological Side of Industrial Ecology

Organizational (system) properties (Inter)connectedness, highly organized Community Cooperation (Limited forms of competition) Diversity Local sufficiency

Flow (dynamic) properties Material stock cycles (closed loops) Energy cascades (extracting the thermodynamic potential)

Living on renewable sources (solar inputs) Steady-state, not equilibrium

Entropy minimizing

Prigogine noted a link between these two characteristics


The Industrial Side of Industrial Ecology

Firms as principal agents Technological innovation and change Life-cycle product design (LCA) Energy and material flows (MFA) Industrial organization and structure

Industrial complexes


Industrial Ecology—Design Principles

Critical technologies and infrastructure Improving the metabolic pathways of industrial

processes and materials use Creating loop-closing industrial ecosystems Dematerializing industrial output Systematizing patterns of energy use

New rules and new roles Balancing industrial input and output to natural

ecosystem capacity Aligning policy to conform with long-term industrial

system evolution Creating new action-coordinating structures


Transformative Potential Of Products & Services

Bring about a shift in underlying social structures so as to produce a more explicit sense of responsibility

Produce de-materialization; de-toxifications and de-energization (or de-carbonization)

Bring about a shift in the mode of social living from having to being in the sense that Fromm uses the terms

The challenge to business (and others) is to design products and services that:


PSS Can Move towards SustainabilityChanging Individual Behavior

ReflexiveMonitoring

Tools (PSS)

Commitments

Authority

Outcomes THE “REAL” World

Beliefs

MYWorld

RoutinesHabitsIntentions

Product ‘language’

Having

Being

Enjoying

Buying

Connectedness

PrecautionCooperation

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