Preliminary Product Development Approach for Discarded …
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as aid in increasing product diversity, greater competitiveness among companies,
greater product supply and consequently lower cost to the final consumer.
However, from an environmental point of view, some negative aspects should
be highlighted such as reduced product life cycles, stimulating premature disposal
and, therefore, an unnecessary increase in waste discarded in the environment. With
the development of new products, it is possible to meet specific market segments,
incorporating new technologies and adapting to new standards and legal restrictions
(Rozenfeld et al. 2006). In their Unified Model, the PDP should include strategic
planning activities at the beginning of the process and activities to monitor the production and withdrawal of the product from the market at the end of the development
process. For this author, the main division of PDP activities is classified into only three
macro-phases that comprise pre-development, development and post-development.
To certify the product’s quality it is necessary to analyse and search constant improvement in all process stages, which minimises defects, waste, unnecessary disposals
and environmental impacts and because it is a complex process, several models were
developed and proposed to structure product development.
4 Reuse of Discarded Materials and Reduction
of Industrial Waste—Sustainable Production
Currently, products are designed aiming at manufacturing easiness, cost reduction
and profit maximisation, but in return, they generate large amounts of waste (Barbieri
2007). According to the European Commission (2012), since 2007, they established
a standardised document model that brings the environmental profile of the life cycle
of each manufactured product, called EPD (Environmental Product Declaration),
and each company should be responsible for its fulfilment. This document assists
consumers at the time of their decision of which product to choose from different
suppliers. Indicators such as life cycle time and percentage of reuse of discarded
product materials are the indicators with the highest relevance in the consumer
decision-making process in recent years (Del Borghi et al. 2007).
According to The Great Recovery Project (2012), four major guidelines can
be applied together or separately, which contribute to the creation of sustainable
products oriented to the maximum reuse of materials and minimal generation of
waste. To achieve a level of production considered sustainable it is necessary to
encourage aspects such as longevity, durability, repair potential, and upgrade possibility, reuse, remanufacturing and recycling from the early stages of product design.
In addition, companies’ business models would need to be reviewed, changing the
ways of parameters visualisation, such as making the consumer a user of a shared
product, eliminating scheduled obsolescence, and creating standardisations of design
for disassembly.
299
as aid in increasing product diversity, greater competitiveness among companies,
greater product supply and consequently lower cost to the final consumer.
However, from an environmental point of view, some negative aspects should
be highlighted such as reduced product life cycles, stimulating premature disposal
and, therefore, an unnecessary increase in waste discarded in the environment. With
the development of new products, it is possible to meet specific market segments,
incorporating new technologies and adapting to new standards and legal restrictions
(Rozenfeld et al. 2006). In their Unified Model, the PDP should include strategic
planning activities at the beginning of the process and activities to monitor the production and withdrawal of the product from the market at the end of the development
process. For this author, the main division of PDP activities is classified into only three
macro-phases that comprise pre-development, development and post-development.
To certify the product’s quality it is necessary to analyse and search constant improvement in all process stages, which minimises defects, waste, unnecessary disposals
and environmental impacts and because it is a complex process, several models were
developed and proposed to structure product development.
4 Reuse of Discarded Materials and Reduction
of Industrial Waste—Sustainable Production
Currently, products are designed aiming at manufacturing easiness, cost reduction
and profit maximisation, but in return, they generate large amounts of waste (Barbieri
2007). According to the European Commission (2012), since 2007, they established
a standardised document model that brings the environmental profile of the life cycle
of each manufactured product, called EPD (Environmental Product Declaration),
and each company should be responsible for its fulfilment. This document assists
consumers at the time of their decision of which product to choose from different
suppliers. Indicators such as life cycle time and percentage of reuse of discarded
product materials are the indicators with the highest relevance in the consumer
decision-making process in recent years (Del Borghi et al. 2007).
According to The Great Recovery Project (2012), four major guidelines can
be applied together or separately, which contribute to the creation of sustainable
products oriented to the maximum reuse of materials and minimal generation of
waste. To achieve a level of production considered sustainable it is necessary to
encourage aspects such as longevity, durability, repair potential, and upgrade possibility, reuse, remanufacturing and recycling from the early stages of product design.
In addition, companies’ business models would need to be reviewed, changing the
ways of parameters visualisation, such as making the consumer a user of a shared
product, eliminating scheduled obsolescence, and creating standardisations of design
for disassembly.