Survey on Environmentally Conscious Design in the Japanese Industrial Machinery Sector

摘要

Product assessment carried out from the viewpoint of environmental aspects is one of the tools which are commonly used for environmentally conscious design (ECD). However, it sometimes becomes little more than a token procedure for some design engineers because there are too many items in the product assessment stage to properly evaluate their products. In addition, the evaluation items might not accurately reflect the environmental requirements for the products. In this paper, we surveyed the current status of ECD in the Japanese industrial machinery sector, and then we proposed several guides for use by manufacturers and/or industrial organizations when writing product standards involved in the preparation of appropriate product assessment guidelines.