Ecodesign or Design for the Environment describes a series of initiatives that can be used in the design phase of a product or building in order to pre-emptively reduce the ecological impacts associated with manufacture, use and disposal of that product. Design for the Environment attempts to give the minimisation of ecological impacts the same status as other more conventional Design for X criteria, such as design for cost effectiveness, efficient assembly, ergonomics, reliability, etc. Ecodesign can make use of LCAs to create EMPs for improving the ecoefficiency of what is being designed, by for instance making use of recycled materials.
There are a number of limitations to ecodesign that prevent it, as it is normally practised, from being a source of sustainments:
1) as with many environmental initiatives, the understanding of ecological impacts used in ecodesign is often quite limited, and the objective is only ever minimisation of those impacts.
2) as with many ecological impact minimisation strategies, the focus tends to fall on the manufacturing process an perhaps disposal issues, with less emphasis on designing more sustainable modes of use. No consideration is given to sustainability or unsustainability of all the habits and related products involved with the use of the product being ecodesigned.
3) as with many techniques, ecodesign frequently lapses into an instrumental activity, box-ticking checklists. The understanding of design informing ecodesign is mostly quite limited; designing is thought to finish once the product goes to manufacture, ignoring all the behaviours and attitudes that go on being designed by the use of the product.
We should point out the EcoDesign Foundation was founded on the belief that the term 'ecodesign', which was taking hold in the early 1990s, could be expanded to become the agency for major cultural change. It is because this ambition is no longer sustainable that the EDF is playing down its title and strategically promoting the idea of 'sustainments' instead.
