Sustainable Eco-Design and Environmental Analysis of Products

Dear Colleagues,

All products that we produce use and dispose cause environmental degradation in some way. Some products are made of high-energy-demanding materials, others use huge amount of resources (water, energy…) during its use phase and others ends up as litter, polluting our seas and oceans, and affecting wild life, just to give some examples.

Bearing this in mind, added to climate emergency situation in which we are currently, it seems essential to rethink the way in which we produce, consume and dispose, and the inter-relation of our actions with natural systems. Anticipating the environmental impacts related to products before they are put on the market is essential. This can be done by means of applying a life cycle approach and environmental assessment tools such as life cycle assessment (LCA), which may help to focus design strategies in those phases where it is most effective from the environmental point of view. All that without forgetting other important aspects of design as aesthetics, functionality, ergonomics or safety; that means practicing “Eco-design”. This new mode of design can also take advantage of other currents of thought as the enhancement of circular business models, all of them with the aim of achieving a more sustainable economy.

Papers exploring different environmental assessment tools as well as demonstrating the environmental improvement of eco-designed products will be welcomed. Improvements in LCA methodology to adapt it to the new paradigm of circular economy or its measurement by means of circularity indicators will also be welcomed.

Dr. Alba Bala
Guest Editor

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• ecodesing
• LCA
• Life Cycle Assessment
• environmental assessment
• eco-efficiency
• circularity
• circularity indicators
• circular economy
• Material Flow Analysis