Eco-audits
Figure 7.1 shows the procedure for the eco-audit of a product. The inputs are of two types. The first are drawn from a user-entered bill of materials, process choice, transport …
Exploring the data: property charts
Data sheets like those of Chapter 12 list material properties, but they present no comparisons and they give no perspective. The way to achieve these is to plot material property …
Energy and CO2 footprints of energy, transport, and use
Energy is used to make materials and to shape, join, and finish them to make products. Energy is used to transport the products from where they are made to where …
The eco-attributes of materials
Table 6.1 lists ecodata for materials in a similar format to the data sheets of Chapter 12. Here we step through the blocks, explaining what the names mean. The data …
Data precision: recalibrating expectations
The engineering properties of materials—their mechanical, thermal, and electrical attributes—are well characterized. They are measured with sophisticated equipment according to internationally accepted standards and are reported in widely accessible handbooks …
The consequences
The burden this legislation places on the materials and manufacturing industries is considerable. The requirements are far-reaching: ■ Documentation of the use of any one of 30,000 listed chemicals ■ …
Economic instruments: taxes and trading schemes
"Economic instruments manipulate market forces to influence the behaviour of consumers and manufacturers in ways that are more subtle and effective than conventional controls, and they generally do so at …
National legislation: standards, directives, taxes, trading tools
"The Council of the European Union, having regard to A, B, and C, acting in accordance with procedures P Q, and R of activities X, Y and Z, and whereas... …
International treaties, protocols, and conventions
It is exceedingly difficult to negotiate enforceable treaties that bind all the nations of the planet to a single course of action; the diversity of culture, national priorities, economic development, …
Growing awareness and legislative response
Table 5.1 lists nine documents that have had profound influence on current thinking about the effects of human activity on the environment. The publications span a little less than 50 …
The long reach of legislation
5.1 Introduction and synopsis The prophet Moses, seeking to set standards for the ways in which his people behaved, created or received (according to your viewpoint) 10 admirably concise commandments. …
Recycling: resurrecting materials
Of the five end-of-life options shown in Figure 4.1, only one meets the essential criteria that: ■ It can return waste materials into the supply chain ■ It can do …
The problem of packaging
Few applications of materials attract as much criticism as their use in packaging. Packaging ends its functional life as soon as the package is opened. It is ephemeral, it is …
End-of-first-life options
Figure 4.1 introduces the options: landfill, combustion for heat recovery, recycling, reengineering, and reuse. Landfill. Many of the products we now reject are committed to landfill. Already there is a …
What determines product life?
The rapid turnover of products we see today is a comparatively recent phenomenon. In earlier times, furniture was bought with the idea that it would fill the needs not just …
A resource?
CONTENTS 4.1 Introduction and synopsis When stuff is useful, we show it respect and call it material. When the same stuff ceases to be useful, we lose respect for …
Appendix: software for LCA
The most common uses of life-cycle assessment are for product improvement ("How can I make my products greener?"), support of strategic choices ("Is this or that the greener development path?"), …
Summary and conclusion
Products, like organisms, have a life, during the course of which they interact with their environment. Their environment is also ours; if the interaction is a damaging one, it diminishes …
The strategy for eco-selection of materials
The need, as we've already said, is for an assessment strategy that addresses current concerns and combines acceptable cost burden with sufficient precision to guide decision making. The strategy should …
Streamlined LCA
Emerging legislation imposes ever-increasing demands on manufacturers for eco-accountability. The EU Directive 2005/32/EC on Energy Using Products (EuPs), for example, requires that manufacturers of EuPs must demonstrate "that they have …
Life-cycle assessment: details and difficulties
Formal methods for LCA first emerged in a series of meetings organized by the Society for Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC), of which the most significant were held in 1991 …
The material life cycle
The idea of a life cycle has its roots in the biological sciences. Living organisms are born; they develop, mature, grow old, and, ultimately, die. The progression is inherent in …
The materials life cycle
Manufacture Resources Use Disposal 3.1 Introduction and synopsis The materials of engineering have a life cycle. They are created from ores and feedstock. These are manufactured into products that are …
Summary and conclusion
Growing global population and prosperity increase the demand for energy and materials. The growth in demand is approximately exponential, meaning that consumption grows at a rate that is proportional to …
. Reserves, the resource base, and resource life
The materials on which industry depends are drawn, very largely, from the Earth's reserves of minerals. A mineral reserve, R, is defined as that part of a known mineral deposit …
Exponential growth and doubling times
A modern industrialized state is extremely complex, heavily dependent on a steady supply of raw materials. Most materials are being produced at a Table 2.2 The water demands of energy …
Resource consumption
Materials. Speaking globally, we consume roughly 10 billion (1010) tonnes of engineering materials per year, an average of 1.5 tonnes per person, though it is not distributed like that. Figure …
Exercises
E.1.1. Use Google to research the history and uses of one of the following materials: ■ Tin ■ Glass ■ Cement ■ Bakelite ■ Titanium ■ Carbon fiber 13 …
Further reading
Delmonte, J. (1985), "Origins of materials and processes", Technomic Publishing Co. ISBN 87762-420-8. (A compendium of information about materials in engineering, documenting its history.) Kent, R. www. tangram. co. uk. …
Summary and conclusion
Homo sapiens—that means us—differ from all other species in its competence in making things out of materials. We are not alone in the ability to make: termites build towers, birds …
Materials and the environment
All human activity has some impact on the environment in which we live. The environment has some capacity to cope with this impact so that a certain level of impact …
Learned dependency: the reliance on nonrenewable materials
Now back to the main point: the environmental aspects of the way we use materials. Use is too weak a word; it sounds as though we have a choice: use, …
Materials: a brief history
Materials have enabled the advance of mankind from its earliest beginnings; indeed, the ages of mankind are named after the dominant material of the day: the Stone Age, the Age …
. Introduction: material dependence
1.1 Introduction and synopsis This book is about materials: the environmental aspects of their production, their use, their disposal at end of life, and ways to choose and design with …
The CES software
The audit and selection tools developed in the text are implemented in the CES Edu 09 software, a powerful materials information system that is widely used for both teaching and …
