Sustainable Design

Vertical vegetation design decisions and their impact on energy consumption in subtropical cities

by Yael Stav

Vertical vegetation is vegetation growing on, or adjacent to, the unused sunlit exterior surfaces of buildings in... more Vertical vegetation is vegetation growing on, or adjacent to, the unused sunlit exterior surfaces of buildings in cities. Vertical vegetation can improve the energy efficiency of the building on which it is installed mainly by insulating, shading and transpiring moisture from foliage and substrate. Several design parameters may affect the extent of the vertical vegetation's improvement of energy performance. Examples are choice of vegetation, growing medium geometry, north/south aspect and others. The purpose of this study is to quantitatively map out the contribution of several parameters to energy savings in a subtropical setting. The method is thermal simulation based on EnergyPlus configured to reflect the special characteristics of vertical vegetation. Thermal simulation results show that yearly cooling energy savings can reach 25% with realistic design choices in subtropical environments. The most important parameter is the aspect of walls covered by vegetation. Vertical vegetation covering walls facing north (south for the northern hemisphere) will result in the highest energy savings. In making plant selections, the most significant parameter is Leaf Area Index (LAI). Plants with larger LAI, preferably LAI>4, contribute to greater savings whereas LAI<2 can actually consume energy. Change of growing medium thickness from 6cm to 8cm causes dramatic increase in energy savings from 2% to 18%. It is best to use a growing material with high water retention, due to the importance of evapotranspiration for cooling. Similarly, for increased savings in cooling energy, sufficient irrigation is required. To conclude, the choice of design parameters for vertical vegetation is crucial in making sure that it contributes to energy savings rather than energy consumption. Optimal design decisions can create a dramatic sustainability enhancement for the built environment in subtropical climates.

Ecodesign Tools: One basis to operacionalize sustainable design

by José Vicente

Co-authored with Rui Frazão, Fernando Moreira da Silva, publiseh in Proceedings of VI International Congress on Design Research - October, 2011 - Lisbon, Portugal

This paper aims to provide an analysis of the different types of available ecodesign tools, their benefits,... more This paper aims to provide an analysis of the different types of available ecodesign tools, their benefits, capabilities and problems, to understand how these instruments could serve as a foundation for developing a practical body for sustainable product design, thus allowing the design to be able to promote a shift to a paradigm of sustainable production and consumption.

UAD Product Design

by Gianluca Medri

“Torricelliana” (ISSN 1827-4919), The Bullettin of Società Torricelliana di Scienze e Lettere di Faenza. v. 61-62, pp. 53 – 64. (2010-2011).

The design and development of disposable, or Use-And-Discard (UAD), products are analyzed from a more conscious... more The design and development of disposable, or Use-And-Discard (UAD), products are analyzed from a more conscious engineering standpoint. A comprehensive definition of UAD products is proposed and specific design suggestions are reported for the sake of product sustainability.

Sustainability of Public Health Programs

by Alan Card

Card AJ. Sustainability of Public Health Programs. American Journal of Public Health. 2012;102(5):776-777.

http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2011.300498

If Small is Beautiful.....Exclusive beats it.

by Alvaro HIDALGO

Luxury as a factor to set carrying capacity .TALC Luxury as a factor to set carrying capacity .TALC

A Model for Integral Sustainable Design Explored through Daylighting

by Mark DeKay

Socially responsible design: thinking beyond the triple bottom line to socially responsive and sustainable product design

by Gavin Melles

CoDesign Volume 7, Issue 3-4, 2011 Special Issue: Socially Responsive Design

As the focus of product design has shifted from exclusively commercial to sustainability and social concerns, design... more As the focus of product design has shifted from exclusively commercial to sustainability and social concerns, design education in this area has endeavoured to keep pace. Victor Papanek's book Design for the real world, crystallised many of the systemic social, economic and environmental concerns into an argument for change through eco-design, inclusive design and, in business and corporate contexts, a triple bottom line of social, environmental and economic factors. Simultaneously, design has developed and evolved participatory and co-design approaches, with high-profile consultancies such as IDEO proving that early involvement of designers with ‘wicked’ social and environmental problems is possible. This position paper revisits Papanek's agenda for industrial design, and examines the link with participatory approaches, and existing socially responsible design agendas and examples. Identifying eight critical features of socially sustainable product design, this paper suggests that Papanek's original agenda for socially responsible and sustainable design has been partly fulfilled and must be developed further through the changed role of the designer as facilitator of flexible design solutions that meet local needs and resources.

A Political Sociology of Socionatures

by Damian White

Getting stuck into the grow or die/treadmill of production/ecological modernization, political ecology/new ecology/skepticism debate around political economy. Wrote this five years ago and I'm still amazed by how little US environmental sociology and political ecology engage with each other. It's almost as if they live in different worlds.....

Post Industrial Possibilities and Urban Social Ecologies

by Damian White

Thinking about the legacy of Murray Bookchin after his death for environmental social theory and politics. Yes, he could be a big pain in the ass. However, his focus on urban ecology, post Malthusian social ecological politics, post scarcity focus, ecological humanism and attempt to initiate a discussion about the need for a 'green industrial revolution' was seminal and still unacknowledged and much of his broad aspirations were proposing an much more interesting agenda than anything being proposed in much environmental sociology, cultural geography or political science.

Technonatures Introduction White Wilbert

by Damian White

An attempt to survey and think through the political implications of hybridity discourses such as Latour and Haraway for environmental politics. This is the introductory chapter from D.White and C.Wilbert (Eds) Technonatures: Environments, Technologies, Spaces, and Places in the Twenty-first CenturyISBN13: 978-1-55458-150-4, 2009.

Lots of other really interesting cuts in the book from Erik Swyngedouw, Sarah Whatmore, Mike Michael, Steve Hinchliffe and others ...check it out at Available from http://www.wlu.ca/press/Catalog/white-wilbert.shtml

Relire Papanek

by Lionel Devlieger

Published in 'Criticat' n°5, 2010, pp. 92-109.

Relire Papanek, "re-read Papanek" is a re-discovery of Victor Papanek's major work, 'Design for the Real... more Relire Papanek, "re-read Papanek" is a re-discovery of Victor Papanek's major work, 'Design for the Real World', first published in 1971. The article shows the relevance and freshness of some of the insights gained by Papanek in terms of sustainable and socially responsible design 40 years ago.

A CREATIVE TOOL TO BREAK HABITS: BREAKDOWN OF FUNCTIONS, DISASSOCIATIONS & COUNTER QUESTIONS (BDC)

by Tore Gulden

Co-authored with Arild Berg

Research and practice have engendered several creative tools on how to generate ground-breaking products with less... more Research and practice have engendered several creative tools on how to generate ground-breaking products with less environmental impact adjusted to a down-to-earth production state. However the relation between the repetitive uses of the same creative tools is a paradox in relation to habit psychology.  Design educators expect creative solutions from the students although they facilitate to establish habits through arranging for repetitive performance of design and idea generating processes.
This article introduces the key terms Breakdown, Disassociations & Counter questions, (BDC), as the main facets in a creative tool, a process identified in engineering practice.
The strategy model was synthesized through building structures by literature studies. The BDC tool was also explored through analysis of external consistence and usefulness. Case studies were analyzed by disclosing structures to generate new solutions for the model.
The model was used as a tool for knowledge transfer in design education. Students adapted the method through implementation of the model in their design process. The practical results were that the tool can help design students in breaking habits established and moreover facilitate a design approach that leads to innovation within an area of constraints. This results in a new proposal of the BDC tool which include leading the thinking process into a social or emotional context and goal description.

On Wearing: A Critical Framework for Valuing Design's Already Made

by alison gill

With Abby Mellick Lopes. Published in ‘Design and Culture’ (the journal of the Design Studies Forum) Vol 3, Iss 3 (November 2011): 307-27.

A sustainable material culture is perhaps more about making new relationships than making new things. This paper... more A sustainable material culture is perhaps more about making new relationships than making new things. This paper explores the topography of what we are calling “Design's already made,” including the artifacts, practices, and perceptions, via the lens of practice theory and in response to the problem of the largely unsustainable material cultures of design. Our investigation is framed by the term “wearing.” Wearing – as a recurrent form of engagement between bodies and designed artifacts or as an index of use and duration – is a multimodal concept that brings abstract time into specific material and aesthetic relations. We contrast “wearing” to the “object time” (Baudrillard 1998) of material and symbolic systems that make new, purportedly improved , but “inexperienced” things available to us in consumer culture. Wearing induces a critical practice of attending to those things that are declining from object time, which in this era of destructive wasting, need to be recalled, repaired and repurposed. Wearing reveals that design, in spite of the widespread practice of trading completed designs, is better characterised as unfinished, potentially open to the value-creating processes of its users. We elaborate on this idea by drawing on a range of examples across the design disciplines. 

Recoding Abandoned Products: student visual designers experiment to sustain product lives

by alison gill

Joint paper with Abby Mellick Lopes.
Published in Niedderer, K., K. Mey and S. Roworth-Stokes, (eds.) (2011). EKSIG 2011: Skin Deep - Experiential Knowledge and Multi-Sensory Communication (Conference Proceedings CD). University for the Creative Arts, UK. ISBN: 978-0-9564160-70.

Abstract
This conference paper outlines the development, delivery and evaluation of a student project for visual... more Abstract
This conference paper outlines the development, delivery and evaluation of a student project for visual communicators in a second year teaching unit where students are investigating the communication contexts of contemporary consumer values and the material and symbolic waste to which design contributes. The student exercise is part of a pedagogical strategy to seed education about sustainable design practices and is in response to an ongoing research project investigating the role of visual communications design in supporting more enduring relationships with existing products and the value-creating practices of users. The authors’ research draws in part on the sustainable design theory of Fry (2009) and the experimental work of Dutch design group Eternally Yours. The students were asked to employ the visual strategy of ‘recoding’ to reconceptualise abandoned products, a strategy of inserting new meanings into existing sign pairings of image signifier and referent and reformulating their value constructions. Recoding bears a strong relation to the familiar critical practices used in ‘culture jamming’ to disrupt the commercial construction of values in branding culture. As it encapsulates critical potential, recoding was presented to students as an opportunity for visual experiment and to transform the aesthetic expression of already existing products.
The ambition for this student project was that it would open up reflection on the sensory complexities and competencies of everyday practices of product use that might sustain product values and involve students in unveiling the experiential knowledge(s) of users and their artefacts. Primarily, recoding involves a strategic negotiation of how visual communicators can draw from and frame these reflections. It also involves the possibility to learn as both consumers and designers who implement use practices that evolve significantly, if incrementally over time. As such, practices can be linked to past competencies that are available for salvage, modification and redirection. This conference paper provided the researchers with the opportunity to reflect on the students’ creative responses to the challenges of recoding within a learning context and evaluate the project’s ability to advance the research findings, as well as refine it for future iterations. With exciting insights into the types of products, skills and experiences to which the students have access for their revisualisations, their creative outcomes revealed how challenging it was to find alternatives to the insistent tendencies of product advertising to fetishise novelty and perfect form.

Keywords
recoding; sustainability; visual communication education; experiential; multi-sensory; durability; material practices

Damian White A Green Industrial Revolution Sustainable Technological Innovation in a Global Age

by Damian White

Sympathetic critique of Natural Capitalism and Factor Four literatures......some initial attempts to formulate questions that a critical sociology of design should be asking......

Evaluation of a Sustainable Hospital Design based on its Social and Environmental Outcomes

by Zig Wu

Cornell University Unpublished Masters Thesis

The study assessed the performance of a newly-built sustainable hospital by comparing the thermal comfort of its... more The study assessed the performance of a newly-built sustainable hospital by comparing the thermal comfort of its patients and staff, and the ambient thermal conditions with those of two other hospitals with less sophisticated designs. Additionally, a facility management perspective was used to understand the role hospital administrators had in contributing to sustainable design outcomes and document the unanticipated challenges and unintended consequences of operating the newly-built sustainable hospital.
Data were collected through thermal environment equipment, a thermal comfort survey, and interviews with care providers, patients, and facility managers. The hypotheses were that the hospital with the modern and more sophisticated sustainable ventilation design features would have a higher level of thermal comfort and lower heat index in the naturally ventilated wards than hospitals without those features and that thermal comfort would be higher in air-conditioned wards than naturally ventilated wards.
The results indicate that sophisticated sustainable hospital designs can improve the ambient thermal environment and occupant thermal comfort but not all those features were necessary. The study also suggests the need for adopting an integrated sustainable design strategy to prevent or mitigate some of the facility operation challenges encountered. Additionally, the study proposes for a shift in thermal comfort standards and green building rating tools to meet the unique thermal comfort needs of hospital users.

Clarifying the role of design within the Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development FSSD

by Outi Ugas

Co-authored with Cindy Kohtala. Published in the Sustainability in Design: NOW! Conference proceedings, Greenleaf Publishing, ISBN 978-1-906093-54-9

Despite advances in design-for-sustainability research and education, it is not always evident that design practice is... more Despite advances in design-for-sustainability research and education, it is not always evident that design practice is willing or able to integrate sustainability goals and principles into design business strategies, nor to engage in wider systems thinking beyond the agency–client relationship. With the aid of a small survey conducted in Finland, this study explores the knowledge and competence challenges and opportunities in driving a design-for-sustainability competitive edge in local commercial design practice, especially when supported by a robust framework such as the Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development (FSSD). One preliminary finding suggests there is a notable gap between those designers that choose to operate socially/economically sustainably and those environmentally/economically sustainably. Considering design as a way to interact between human society and the ecosystem, not only the user and the product/service system, would give design practitioners a stronger footing as business globally moves more towards a people-planet-profit model of operating.

Integral Sustainable Design: transformative perspectives

by Mark DeKay

New book. Available from Amazon, Earthscan, or Routledge web sites

This book offers practical and theoretical tools for more effective sustainable design solutions and for communicating... more This book offers practical and theoretical tools for more effective sustainable design solutions and for communicating sustainable design ideas to today's diverse stakeholders.

It uses integral theory to make sense of the many competing ideas in this area and offers a powerful conceptual framework for sustainable designers through the four main perspectives of: behaviours; systems; experiences; cultures.

It also uses human developmental theory to reframe sustainable design across four levels of complexity present in society: the Traditional, Modern, Postmodern, and Integral waves. Profuse with illustrations and examples, the book offers many conceptual tools including:

• twelve principles of integral sustainable design
• sixteen prospects of sustainable design
• six perceptual shifts for ecological design thinking
• five levels of sustainable design aesthetics
• ten injunctions for designing connections to nature.

Sun, wind, and light. Architectural design strategies

by Mark DeKay

Book, 2001, 2nd edition, by Mark DeKay and G. Z. Brown

also see www.sunwindlight.net

How to design... more also see www.sunwindlight.net

How to design buildings that heat with the sun, cool with the wind, light with the sky, and move into the future using on-site renewable resources

Developed for rapid use during schematic design, this book clarifies relationships between form and energy and gives designers tools for designing sustainably. It also:

* Applies the latest passive energy and lighting design research
* Organizes information by architectural elements at three scales:
* building groups, individual buildings, and building parts
* Brings design strategies to life with examples and practical design tools

Features:
* 109 analysis techniques and design strategies
* More than 750 illustrations, sizing graphs, and tables
* Both inch-pound and metric units

Green a city grow a wall

by Yael Stav