WHY MANUFACTURERS NEED TO CONSIDER SUSTAINABLE DESIGN FOR CIRCULARITY

As the UK races to achieve ambitious net-zero goals, there are numerous opportunities to make new product designs more sustainable - from integrating greener materials to exploring efficient manufacturing methods to help cut emissions.

Here, Rory Ingram, Design Engineering Team Lead at the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland (NMIS), operated by the University of Strathclyde, discusses why manufacturers should put environmental sustainability front and centre during the product and system development phases.

For any business, global conversations over the last few years have rapidly moved environmental sustainability up the agenda. Net-zero has been spoken of publicly more in the last decade than ever before and, as the UK and Scottish Governments set targets of achieving net-zero by 2050 and 2045 respectively, there has never been more pressure on businesses to take action to limit their impact on the planet.

Hardware manufacturers must consider environmental sustainability within their emerging or evolving operations, not least in product and system development. Sustainable design from the outset allows them to meet emerging demands and avoid being left behind.

Unlocking Potential

When it comes to manufacturing, the design phase of any project unlocks the most potential for achieving sustainability within a product or part. Here, decisions are made that impact the sustainability of part manufacture, how environmentally friendly it will be in operation and what happens at the end of life when it is beyond repair or remanufacture.

Questions we’ll explore include whether the selected material is making the part too heavy or whether the coating makes it more difficult to recycle. We’ll also consider where the material is sourced from, is it the opposite side of the planet, when a suitable alternative could be sourced locally?

Asking these questions before manufacture is essential because decisions made during this phase can have a negative effect later on, such as during decommissioning. Responsible, forward thinking manufacturers will also focus on user friendliness and ensure that parts are serviceable, allowing maintenance, repair and remanufacture.

A Global Drive For Sustainable Engineering Design

There is a global drive to achieve more sustainable engineering design and this is echoed within many of the R&D projects coming through to the Design Engineering team here at the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland (NMIS).

In fact, funding for R&D is increasingly much more likely to be awarded for a sustainable project and we’re noticing that sustainable designs across all sectors are more likely to attract investment, providing a real competitive edge to businesses on the front foot.

The linear models once accepted –where a part goes to landfill after use – are being replaced by circular models where the hardware, or elements of it, are reused. Instead of cradle-to-grave, design should look to achieve a cradle-to-cradle model with a new lease of life at the end, recapturing a significant portion of value.

At NMIS, the Design Engineering team is completely agnostic; we’re not tied to any sectors or technologies, meaning we redeploy our significant and diverse industry experience and the tools we’ve developed within any project. We consider ourselves process experts instead of application experts, making it low risk to work with us. As part of the High Value Manufacturing (HVM) Catapult family, we’re here to create impact. We want your projects to be successful –bringing the very best of manufacturing back to Scotland and the wider UK with sustainable solutions that support net-zero targets.

Time To Rethink Focus On Recycling

There are many benefits to be reaped from using recyclable materials. Virgin material is scarce, rarely local to the UK and the sourcing of it can be incredibly harmful to the planet and people. Using a material that has been recycled will reduce carbon footprint and extend the lifecycle of the material. There are also added benefits associated with reduced material costs for manufacturers.

However, when it comes to sustainable design, recycling sits relatively low in terms of impact and those focusing purely on recycling material at the end of life will be left behind. Within the Design Engineering team at NMIS, we work to a hierarchical five ‘R’ strategy, which shows the order of precedence and impact each ‘R’ can have.

The first ‘R’ with the highest impact is rethink: improving the utilisation of a product and moving away from the linear model. Where it’s typical to sell a product to every user, for example, businesses may consider alternative models such as lease, hire or servitisation, or it might be that a product can have additional functionality built in to negate the need for multiple products.

Next on the list is reduce, where manufacturers should consider optimising parts, minimising the energy and material usage in manufacture as much as possible. Cutting back on the number of fasteners and total part count, reducing size and material usage, ensuring every feature has a function, and minimising energy usage are all important considerations in the design phase. As we look to the next generation of products and systems, reduce will be essential as we cut back on waste material and excess energy consumption. There is the added benefit here of reductions across costs in the long term.

Remake is the third focus area with the goal of designing a part that can easily be restored or serviced back into ‘as new’ condition for use. Materials that allow for repair options are preferred and it’s important that the design can be disassembled and easily inspected and cleaned, enabling remanufacture, repurposing and refurbishment as appropriate.

Recycling comes in next and, at design phase, it’s important to lock in the use of materials that can be easily recycled, avoiding using additives, coatings and painted finishes that make recycling harder. Likewise, avoiding a mixed material component, if possible, helps. Using materials which have already been recycled or recovered in your design is another worthwhile consideration if a robust, reliable and repeatable source is available.

The last ‘R’ of the five is recover. This is where, at end of life, manufacturers would incinerate the material to recover energy if all else fails. At design phase, using materials that give off harmful fumes when burned should be avoided and replaced with materials incorporating high combustion energy. It may be at the end of the list with the lowest impact, but this is a critical final option if none of the previous 4 R’s have been possible.

The design phase greatly influences product-related environmental impact and crucially, it is irresponsible for manufacturers not to consider circular strategies by design. These five strategies can transition product life cycles from a linear to a circular economy and highlight why recycling is one of the last things you should be planning for. Of course, we want to extract the most value possible from material used at end of life, however there are more steps to be taken before we get there.

Bringing Sustainable Design To Manufacture

Sustainable design applies to all sectors but is more challenging for incumbent products and systems, particularly in high integrity sectors, where there are strict regulations, codes and standards. Here altering design can be more complex, with costs associated with redesign, requalification and certification often prohibitive. That’s not to say it can’t be done but focusing on the sustainability of new and emerging products and systems is likely to be more widely supported unless customers, legislators and taxation intervene.

You may be surprised by the number of companies we encounter, even those seeking to develop new net-zero focused technologies, who have failed to consid- er the sustainability of hardware due to being focused on more efficient operational performance. These manufacturers should embrace circularity to enhance the through-life sustainability of their technologies, possibly further differentiating them from competitor offerings.

As we race closer towards net-zero targets, we’re supporting the businesses we work with through R&D support as they design for a sustainable future and reduce their impact on the environment. Those that are not sustainable will eventually fail to secure investment or find support. The manufacturers leading the way here are set to see a real competitive advantage as consumers, industry and governments invest in the future.

Further information on this topic can be found in the Product Design Scotland Toolkit series. Guide number 12 ‘Sustainable Design, ‘ found here: https://productdesign-scotland.com/design-toolkit/ c

For more information on the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland visit www.nmis.scot