Life Cycle Thinking - A Design Mindset Timothy Allan The first in a series of three articles on life cycle thinking and how it can work in a commercial environment.

1. Focus on sustainability
Life cycle This is the first in a special series new viewpoints such as the supply Life cycle thinking encourages a
of three articles on product design chain – how it’s distributed, retailed, designer to look more closely at the
thinking that covers life cycle thinking, life used and disposed of, all of which interactions over the whole life cycle
cycle management and life cycle can present opportunities for a beyond the most obvious customer
– a design assessment tools. These articles designer to make a contribution. The (the end consumer) to those that
introduce these subjects from a emergent fields of experience and interact with it over its life.
mindset New Zealand design perspective service design leverage the product A collaborative project
and provide some insight into how system to improve how we interact with Locus Research and Scion
they can be applied practically and and deliver the product. investigated exterior cladding in
strategically by designers. The aim the New Zealand market. The first
of these articles and following series approach was to roughly sketch
Words Timothy Allan of workshops (listed overleaf) is to Examples a life cycle and then attribute the
enable you to adopt the principles of A good example of this type of users to phases of the product life
life cycle thinking and initiate change thinking was an investigative design cycle. Architects were pre-purchase,
within your organisation. project in collaboration with Locus builders were pre-purchase and
Research, Lightweight Medical and installation, and end consumers had
the British Environment Partnership some involvement in the first two
Core function (BEP) in the UK. When looking at phases, along with the life of the
Any product, no matter how simple, the potential replacements for the product through to disposal.
exists within a system. A product ubiquitous hospital anti-infection Builders were very interested in
system incorporates the require- screen (the curtain that separates installation factors, whereas this did
ments, users, material inputs and hospital beds), the team defined not concern the end user at all; their
outputs over the course of its life. the core function of the product main concern was weather-tightness
‘Life cycle thinking’ (LCT) seeks as the ‘provision of anti-infection and appearance. Installation became
to understand, interpret, and design protection for the patient over a a critical product improvement
the life of a product. It is system period of seven years’. This was for the subsequent product
oriented rather than object oriented based off the existing cotton screen development as the builder was able
and provides a platform for product washed twice a year for seven years to influence consumers through their
innovation by providing a new lens to and then disposed of. In high risk advice (and regularly did so).
look at the product. wards the consumption is double. Life cycle thinking in product
A principle starting point for The approach was to design development provides an
life cycle thinking is the concept eight different life cycles (product effective platform for integrating
of defining the core function of a systems) these included smart environmental factors. It is
product. An example I like to use fabrics, powered sterilisation, important to build it in so that it is
that is appropriate for New Zealand, recycled plastic fibre. Life cycle not dispensible and viewed as an
is the development of a new milk thinking enabled the team to ‘extra’. There are two predominant
bottle. Instead of just designing the unshackle itself and be really types of environmental assessment:
bottle (albeit a stylish one) we would creative whilst providing credible ‘change oriented’ and ‘accounting’.
look at the ‘delivery of milk’ as this alternatives that both improved the As designers are generally not
is the single most vital role of the product and had the potential to inclined to like accounting, change
bottle whether its plastic, glass or reduce its environmental impact. oriented assessments are better
card, delivered or picked up from the With most products there are suited to our workflow and focus
dairy or the supermarket. usually several customers that will on areas where you can make
www.locusresearch.com This simple pivot provides us with have a say on the product’s success. legitimate improvements.
Issue 94 69

2. Download tools of Environmental Aspects (IoEA) through the product without the
Most of the tools Locus Research technique used by ecologists. It distortion of the life cycle and can
uses to assess and design are outlines the routine inputs and be a useful perspective. This is also a
amalgams of several other outputs and where they occur in the handy preparation for a quantitative
techniques. Soft ware tools that life cycle of a product and is a simple environmental assessment using
offer high level all-encompassing way to qualitatively examine the LCA (which we will deal with in article
analysis should be approached product life cycle. three of this series).
with caution, unless they have been *The MET Matrix (Materials, These three techniques are
tailored to your organisation and Energy and Toxicity) is useful for simple, effective and free and they
your production context. providing an overview and enables encourage a more holistic view that
Timothy Allan is the founder of Simple tools enable transparent you to separate material inputs, is not limited to creating sustainable
Locus Research, in Tauranga. and effective mechanisms to energy inputs and emission (toxicity) products. There are many others
To learn more about sustainable
consider and communicate the out and place them into the broad which are equally useful.
product design processes, check
out our series of three half-day product life cycle, whilst preparing phases of the product life. Life cycle thinking creates
workshops on Life Cycle Thinking a design team for more rigorous *Material and Energy Flow benefit and can improve the
(details opposite) at Unitec in environmental assessment that is diagrammes are another effective experience users and consumers
Auckland on the following dates: required downstream. means of analysing and comparing have with a product through
A very useful simple method scenarios. One of the benefits of this strategic design thinking.
June 12: Life Cycle Thinking
July 3: Life Cycle Management we apply to initial assessments approach is that it provides a view *Download the free templates
August 7: Life Cycle Tools is an evolution of the *Impacts of the flow of energy and materials from www.locusresearch.com
70 Issue 94