Abstract
Material waste from manufacturing poses substantial challenges. European compa-nies generate more than 2.2 billion tons of waste annually. The utilization of already circulating resources plays a vital part in reducing the use of raw materials. The state-of-the-art methodology for designing from waste outlines a linear process with three phases: optimization, analysis, and design. However, there is limited un-derstanding of the critical leap from analysis to designing with waste. Considering the co-evolutionary nature of design activity, it may not be efficient to separate these stages. In fact, research states design outcome is improved when problem-solution co-evolve. This study examines the process of design material assessment performed by industrial designers and technical experts. Through observations and participatory questioning of 13 cases of waste assessment from different industries, we examine and identify four modes of inquiry: 1) primary material sorting, 2) un-derstanding material potentials, 3) identifying areas of application, and 4) value-ranking utilizations.
Keywords
waste; design; sustainability; assessment
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2024.888
Citation
Sander, N., N. Laursen, L., Lau Verndal Bak, B., and Damgaard-Møller, E. (2024) Starting from scraps: Design reuse assessment of waste materials, in Gray, C., Ciliotta Chehade, E., Hekkert, P., Forlano, L., Ciuccarelli, P., Lloyd, P. (eds.), DRS2024: Boston, 23–28 June, Boston, USA. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2024.888
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Conference Track
Research Paper
Included in
Starting from scraps: Design reuse assessment of waste materials
Material waste from manufacturing poses substantial challenges. European compa-nies generate more than 2.2 billion tons of waste annually. The utilization of already circulating resources plays a vital part in reducing the use of raw materials. The state-of-the-art methodology for designing from waste outlines a linear process with three phases: optimization, analysis, and design. However, there is limited un-derstanding of the critical leap from analysis to designing with waste. Considering the co-evolutionary nature of design activity, it may not be efficient to separate these stages. In fact, research states design outcome is improved when problem-solution co-evolve. This study examines the process of design material assessment performed by industrial designers and technical experts. Through observations and participatory questioning of 13 cases of waste assessment from different industries, we examine and identify four modes of inquiry: 1) primary material sorting, 2) un-derstanding material potentials, 3) identifying areas of application, and 4) value-ranking utilizations.