Seminar Report on Sustainability Engineering and Technology

SEMINAR REPORT ON:

SUSTAINABILITY ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY

TABLE OF CONTENTS

S NO DESCRIPTION PAGE NO

1 Introduction 3

2 Sustainable Engineering 6

3 Uses of Sustainable Engineering 11

4 Advances in Sustainable Engineering and

Technology

13

5 The Future of Sustainable Engineering and

Technology

16

6 References 19

Sustainability Engineering and Technology

1. INTRODUCTION

With a population slated to hit nine billion people by the year 2050, only 38 years till

all the oil in the earth is consumed and around 17,000 people dying every day due to

hunger while one third of all the food produced in the world is wasted ever year -

Sustainability is the bridge which connects the gaps in the systems of the world.

From engineering and logistical problems to being able to provide solutions for all

the peoples of the world and the future generations too.

Respecting the adage, ‘We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors; we borrow it

from our children’ sustainability is the way to move forward.

1.1 What is Sustainability?

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) defines

‘Sustainability’ as: “Sustainability is based on a simple principle: Everything that we

need for our survival and well-being depends, either directly or indirectly, on our

natural environment. Sustainability creates and maintains the conditions under which

humans and nature can exist in productive harmony, that permit fulfilling the social,

economic and other requirements of present and future generations.

Sustainability is important to making sure that we have and will continue to have, the

water, materials, and resources to protect human health and our environment.”

The simplest and most fundamental ways of defining sustainability are: ‘the ability to

sustain’, or ‘the capacity to endure’. (SustainAbility, sustainability.com)

2Dept. of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering


1.2 The Need for Sustainability

With burgeoning global population and the ensuing scarcity of resources,

sustainability is becoming essential in all aspects of our daily lives. From the ways

we manufacture, build and create, to the ways in which we consume and produce

waste. Without sustainability, the planet we live on will soon be unable to support us.

If usage of current resources such as water, soil, forests and coal or oil continues at

the same rate as it does now, soon we will be left bereft of actual usable resources.

Future generations will have to resort to desalinating their water, or living in

perpetual scarcity, the carbon di oxide emissions will reach immitigable levels and

even food scarcity will result in manifold problems.

Life, as we know it, will soon come to an end. Freshwater dependent life will soon

become extinct, as will life forms in arctic and subarctic zones. Deforestation will

result in, and is resulting in mass extinction of a number of animals, birds and

reptiles. Experts calculate that 0.01-0.1% of species become extinct every year, by

conservative estimates that amounts to 200 to 2,000 species wiped out annually.

The major push behind getting sustainability on to the ground is due to the future

and the question over whether everything we have now will remain the same then.

1.3 The Types of Sustainability

There are four basic types of sustainability we encounter daily. Namely:

human, economic, social, and environmental.



Humans are considered individual entities whose worth’s are determined by their

health, skills, knowledge, education, and leadership. Humans in turn exist within the

realm of the economy. And the economy within the society, which is extant in the

environment. By saving one – the chain reaction begins in saving the others.

A lot of different entities work to create and foster sustainability within these

categories, for instance the UN, the EPA and the Earth Institute at Columbia

University work towards spreading sustainable practices in society, the environment

and the technological fields respectively.

1.4 A World Without Sustainability

A world in which we have run out of all types of resources is the first which comes to

mind but that is nothing but the beginning. A person might conceive of a future in

which the human race has learned to harness renewable sources of energy for their

every need but the truth is rather starker than that. Although we are slowly moving

towards harnessing these seemingly endless resources such as wind, the tides and

solar energy, we still consume more water, coal, gas, oil, trees, soil and animals

than we can replenish back into the environment.

Scientists estimate that at our current rate we will require 2 planets to fully sustain

us, and if all humans behaved like the developed nations’ then that figure becomes

4.



2. SUSTAINABILITY ENGINEERING

The core concepts of sustainability when integrated with engineering disciplines

such as manufacturing, mechanical engineering, civil and structural engineering,

architecture and any other form of science wherein we use energy, resources and

raw materials to create, convert or produce outputs is labelled as sustainable

engineering.

2.1 What is Sustainability Engineering

UNESCO defines it as: ‘Sustainable engineering is the process of using resources in

a way that does not compromise the environment or deplete the materials for future

generations. Sustainable engineering requires an interdisciplinary approach in all

aspects of engineering and all engineering fields should incorporate sustainability

into their practice in order to improve the quality of life for all.’

Sustainable Engineering considers the system in which the object/ service/ output

being developed will be used, ie, it keeps the environment and other systems

holistically in mind. It Integrates technical and nontechnical issues, acknowledging

the need for engineers to interact with experts in other disciplinesfrom socio-

economic to political and research based sciences allrelated to the problems

encountered. It strives to solve problems for the indefinite future (for ever) while

simultaneously considering the global context (planet).



There are 12 principles which have been defined keeping green engineering in mind

(Anastas and Zimmerman, 2003), they are:

1. Apply green chemistry

2. Prevent rather than treat consequences

3. Design for separation

4. Maximize mass, energy, space and time efficiency

5. “Out-pulled” rather than “input-pushed”

6. View complexity as an investment rather than a complication

7. Durability rather than obsolescence

8. Meet need without excess

9. Minimize material diversity

10. Integrate local material and energy flows

11. Design for commercial “after-life”

12. Renewable and readily available.

2.2 How to Measure and Implement Sustainability

Some tools are available to determine the sustainability impact of a building, product

or output, they are:



2.2.1 Eco-Industrial Parks (EIPs): These mimic nature by gathering industrial

activities in one location to promote interactions and close-loop practices, like in

natural ecosystems. Businesses, companies, factories and the local community

cooperate in order to reduce waste and efficiently share resources. Very rigorous

systems design is required. The best example is the Kalundborg symbiotic network

in Denmark, which has a coal fired thermal power plant, 3500 local homes, a fish

farm, fertilizer factory, pharmaceutical manufacturer, and a wallboard manufacturer.

All the products are cycled in a closed loop from one point to another.

Fig 1: Flow resources in the integrated biosystem of Montford Boys’ Town in Suva,

Fiji



2.2.2 Pollution Prevention (P2): Pollution prevention (P2) is any practice that

reduces, eliminates, or prevents pollution at its source, also known as "source

reduction." Source reduction is fundamentally different and more desirable than

recycling, treatment and disposal.

2.2.3 Design for Environment (DfE): Design for the Environment Program (DfE) is a

United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) program, created in 1992,

that works to prevent pollution, and the risk pollution presents to humans and the

environment. Considerations are: Less material, Less material variety, Recycled

materials, Recyclable materials, Ease of disassembly, Less energy consumption,

Longevity, Modularity.

2.2.4 Design for Manufacturing (DFM) and design for assembly (DFA) are the

integration of product design and process planning into one common activity. The

goal is to design a product that is easily and economically manufactured. Reducing

material and cost overheads and unnecessary products are important parts of

DFMA.

2.2.5 Life-cycle Assessment (LCA): LCA is a technique to assess the environmental

aspects and potential impacts associated with a product, process, or service, by:

Compiling an inventory of relevant energy and material inputs and environmental

releases. Evaluating the potential environmental impacts associated with identified

inputs and releases. It considers the entire product cycle from cradle to grave

(procurement of raw materials, manufacture, distribution, use and disposal)



One especially useful impact factor is known as ‘Okala’. Okala Impact Factors are a

designer-friendly form of LCA developed with robust science. They were designed

for quick “back of an envelope” decision-making, so that an understanding of

ecological impacts can be factored into design decisions as early as the

conceptualiisation phase. Okala Impact Factors have been calculated for more than

500 materials and processes employed in hard products, architecture, soft goods

and electronic systems. They include a wide range of transportation, energy use,

incineration and landfill processes, which allow modeling of environmental

performance over the entire life cycle. It is a designer friendly form of LCA

Fig 2: Okala Impact factors calculated for a

subassembly using either steel leg or aluminium legs. A lower impact factor is a

better impact factor



2.2.6 Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED): This measure is

specifically for buildings. Developed by the US EPA it rates new buildings on the

performance in five key areas: water saving, energy efficiency, materials selection,

and indoor environmental quality.

3. USES OF SUSTAINABLE ENGINEERING

Sustainability is a discipline spanning across more than just one field of engineering.

It finds applications in the energy sector, manufacturing, agriculture, civil, and other

industries.

3.1 How Companies and Businesses are Using Sustainability Engineering

Commercially

The large company 3M uses sustainability to such an extent that it has been ten

years running, winning the Energy Star award from the US EPA and been listed on

the Dow Jones Sustainability index since its inception in 1999.

Their scour pads are ‘greener’ and cleaner as 50% of the fibres used in the cleaning

pad are from the agave plant, which is waste produce in the agave nectar industry

as well as a cleaner alternative to synthetic fibres generally utilized in such cleaning

pads.

3M’s award-winning two-phase immersion technology helps keep hardware cool

through the natural process of evaporation. Using 3M Novec Engineered Fluids, the



technology means less energy used to cool hardware (95% less, to be exact), and

less space to hold components (only one-tenth of what was used before). Novec

fluids are also non-ozone depleting and have low global warming potentials.

Their adhesives, sealants and void fillers eliminate the need for heavier rivets and

metallic bonds in airplanes to make them much lighter and able to carry more fuel,

making the lighter airplanes more fuel efficient by dropping a few thousand pounds.

CEO and president of LEGO group Jørgen Vig Knudstorp has promised in a press

conference to move to new bio based materials instead of petrochemical based

plastics which make the bulk of its bricks now. Their goal is to find new, better and

more sustainable alternatives to existing materials by investing USD 150 million into

the initiative, by far one of the largest single amounts pledged to finding more

sustainable alternatives. For a company which manufactures more than two

thousand elements, or bricks, every second, this is a large commitment, and step in

the right direction. Not only that, they are also committed to a zero waste policy and

a shift toward using 100% renewable energy by the year 2020.

Quite like the company Hewlett-Packard, in their Roseville plant, California USA -

(9,000 employees) is diverting 92-95% of its solid waste; saving almost a million

dollars a year in avoided waste disposal costs ($870,564 in 1998). HP recycles

cardboard, metal, foam, plastic peanuts, low density polyethylene plastics (LDPE),

Instapak, polystyrene plastics, and reuses and recycles pallets with an almost 100%

Zero Waste manufacturing facility.



Unilever, one of the largest consumer goods producing brands in the world, came up

with the concept of ‘Eco Packs’ – small bags/pouches of plastic which you can see

in the market aisles in India too. Which utilize upto 70% less plastic than traditional

pouches, bags or boxes and greenhouse gases by 50-85% per consumer use.

Introduced in developing countries as either refill or standalone packs, these have

had such a positive response that Unilever now plans to introduce them in Europe

too. In China alone, eco-packs for Omo laundry detergent, Comfort fabric

conditioners and Lux body wash, since their release, have saved around €2.5 million

and 940 tonnes of plastic – the weight of 25 Boeing 737s.

4. ADVANCES IN THE FIELD OF SUSTAINABLE ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY

With greater awareness regarding the availability of resources and the production of

large amounts of waste, scientists, researchers and engineers are looking to

maximize dwindling resources and conceptualizing new processes and algorithms

for implementation. Some of the most popular fields of research within Sustainable

Engineering are:

In the production and manufacturing sectors, as: End of life management for hybrid

and electric cars and vehicles. As these cars gain a higher market share year on

year, which itself is a great example of sustainability in engineering as it helps

conserve dwindling oil and gas reserves, it is becoming a challenge to completely

recycle the components which make up these type of cars as opposed to regular



cars where a large percent of the weight is in metallic body components. The EU

regulations state at least 95% of the mass must be recycled by 2015 but in HEVs

(Hybrid/Electric Vehicles) a larger proportion of precious metals and special

components in circuitry and electric components. Further research is being done in

these fields to optimize recycling.

Modelling and Reduction of Water Usage in Manufacturing: The demand for

freshwater in the industrial sector is constantly increasing and is expected to double

by 2030. Ways to improve their water efficiency and reduce their manufacturing

water usage must be found as freshwater scarcity is a large threat. This research

goes beyond existing water modelling methodologies to develop a proactive

approach to water reduction whereby water usage can be modelled at production

process level in order to evaluate the productivity of water usage, and to identify the

water ‘hotspots’ in a manufacturing system. This approach facilitates ‘what-if’

scenario planning using simulation techniques and provides decision support for

evaluation of proposed water reduction strategies.

Waste Energy Recovery within Manufacturing: Energy demand is expected to

continue to increase over the coming decades, and it is predicted that global

demand will be over 50% above current levels by 2030. Despite the growth in low-

carbon sources of energy, fossil fuels remain dominant and thus, to secure future

energy supply, there has been a large focus on research into alternative solutions.

This research has centred around two options of increased renewable energy

supply, and reduced overall energy consumption. Progress in renewable energy

technologies however has been relatively slow and costly, therefore, within the latter



approach there can be three options for moving forwards: reducing scale of

production activities, improving energy efficiencies processes, and recovery/reusing

waste energy. In this context, this research aims to gain an understanding of the

availability of waste energy from manufacturing processes and to develop a model

based decision support tool to enable manufacturers to implement the most

appropriate energy recovery strategies and technologies.

Material Efficient Manufacturing: There is a growing realisation that the current trend

of increasing material consumption within our finite global system is unsustainable.

The economic resilience of manufacturing in the future will rely on actions being

taken now to reduce both the rate of consumption and the environmental impacts

associated with material use. For example, in the case of consumer goods it is

estimated that on average materials account for 50% of the production cost.

Therefore, the efficiency of materials to manufacturing is paramount. The main

objective of this research therefore is to improve manufacturing productivity, whilst

reducing raw material consumption to increase the resilience of the manufacturing

industry worldwide. Towards this goal, this research aims to develop tools for

monitoring and modelling material flow within a factory in order to improve

understanding and decision making, and will also explore new technologies to aid in

material efficiency during manufacture.

Eco-Intelligent Manufacturing: Current manufacturing management systems and

related decision making models are optimised for cost effectiveness, time efficiency

(output) and quality control. These utilise a complex network of knowledge and

information systems to enable manufacturers to remain competitive by making



informed short-term decisions, and by generating forecasts for longer time scales.

However at present, environmental impacts of such manufacturing decisions are

often a secondary consideration, and are not included in existing manufacturing

systems. This research aims to reduce the environmental impact of manufacturing

companies through better informed decision making, reducing the need for heavy

investment. Hence, industry-relevant methods and tools are being developed within

this research to enable the inclusion of environmental considerations within

manufacturing planning, control and management over short, medium and long

timescales.

5. THE FUTURE OF SUSTAINABLE ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY

5.1 Future Trends in Sustainability Engineering

This is one of the most rapidly increasing sectors in engineering. From affordable

wind turbines and solar power which can even be mounted on house roofs, making

sustainable, renewable energy a foreseeable commonplace technology, it is also

being taught in colleges and universities to future scientists and professionals so

they can make an impact in their respective fields. The Earth Institute founded at

Columbia University in New York by Jeffrey Sachs being one of the foremost such

institutions, offering an MS in Sustainability Management.



In India too, in the states of Andhra Pradesh (with the help of the Federal Ministry for

the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Germany) and Gujarat,

eco industrial parks are in the pipeline where there will be co-operation between

businesses and communities and zero waste and pollution.

UNESCO Engineering Initiative, at the Rio +20 conference in 2012, began

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which build upon the achievements of the

Millenium Development Goals. Sustainable development goals that build on the

successes of the Millennium Development Goals, and that apply to all countries, can

provide a tremendous boost to efforts to implement sustainable development and

help us address issues ranging from reducing poverty and creating jobs to the

pressing issues of meeting economic, social and environmental aspirations of all

people. Engineers and scientists will play a leading role in the development of

sustainability across all platforms and nationalities. This is a major mandate of the

UNESCO Engineering Initiative and time will tell how successful the push for

sustainability will be throughout the world.



6. REFERENCES

1. United States Environmental Protection Agency, US EPA,

http://www.epa.gov/sustainability/basicinfo.htm

2. World Proved Reserves of Oil and Natural Gas, Most Recent Estimates -

Energy Information Administration (EIA) - Data from BP Statistical Review, Oil

& Gas Journal, World Oil, BP Statistical Review, CEDIGAZ, and Oil & Gas

Journal.

3. World Environment Day - Food Waste Facts – UNEP,

www.unep.org/wed/2013/quickfacts/

4. The Global Footprint Network, Earth Overshoot Day Report, 2013

5. UNESCO Natural Sciences, UNESCO Engineering Initiative,

http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/science-technology/engineeri

ng/sustainable-engineering/

6. The 12 Principles of Green Engineering, Anastas & Zimmerman,

Environmental Science & Technology, 1 March 2003

7. Kalundborg Municipality. "Kalundborg Symbiosis". Denmark. 2013

8. UT Austin, Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering,

http://www.ce.utexas.edu/prof/hart/333T/documents/SustainableEngineering.

pdf

9. US EPA, P2, Pollution Prevention, Design for Environment,

http://www2.epa.gov/p2, http://www2.epa.gov/dfe



10.3M, Sustainability Report, 2014, http://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/sustainability-

us/

11.Lego, http://www.lego.com/en-us/aboutus/responsibility/environment/goals,

https://education.lego.com/fr-fr/about-us/lego-education-worldwide/making-

lego-bricks

12.Grass Roots Recycling Network, 2013

http://archive.grrn.org/zerowaste/articles/companies_zw.html

13.Unilever Sustainable Living Plan 2014: Scaling for Impact Worldwide,

https://www.unilever.com/Images/uslp-Unilever-Sustainable-Living-Plan-

Scaling-for-Impact-Summary-of-progress-2014_tcm244-424809.pdf

14.The Earth Institute, Columbia University, www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu

15.GIZ, the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and

Nuclear Safety, Germany, https://www.giz.de/en/downloads/giz2012-eco-

industrial-parks-andhra-pradesh-india-en.pdf


Documents

Seminar Report on Sustainability Engineering and Technology